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The
Troubled
Dream of
Genetic
Medicine
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Ethnicity
and
Innovation
in Tay-Sachs,
Cystic Fibrosis,
and
Sickle Cell
Disease
The
Troubled
Dream of
keith
wailoo
Genetic
and
Medicine
pemberton
stephen
the johns hopkins university press Baltimore
© 2006 The Johns Hopkins University Press
All rights reserved. Published 2006
Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper
9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
The Johns Hopkins University Press
2715 North Charles Street
Baltimore, Maryland 21218-4363
www.press.jhu.edu
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Wailoo, Keith.
The troubled dream of genetic medicine : ethnicity and
innovation in Tay-Sachs, cystic fibrosis, and sickle cell
disease / Keith Wailoo and Stephen Pemberton.
p. ; cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
isbn 0-8018-8325-3 (hard cover : alk. paper) —
isbn 0-8018-8326-1 (pbk. : alk. paper)
1. Genetic disorders—Research—Moral and ethical
aspects. 2. Ethnic groups—Diseases. 3. Tay-Sachs
disease—Genetic aspects. 4. Cystic fibrosis—Genetic
aspects. 5. Sickle cell anemia—Genetic aspects.
I. Pemberton, Stephen Gregory. II. Title.
[dnlm: 1. Genetic Diseases, Inborn—ethnology.
2. Genetic Diseases, Inborn—prevention & control.
3. Anemia, Sickle Cell. 4. Cystic Fibrosis. 5. Health
Services Accessibility. 6. Tay-Sachs Disease.
qz 50 w139t 2006]
rb155.5.w35 2006
616'.042—dc22
2005021184
A catalog record for this book is available from the British
Library.
contents
Acknowledgments vii
introduction
Ethnic Symbols in Conflicted Times 1
chapter one
Eradicating a ‘‘Jewish Gene’’:
Promises and Pitfalls in the Fight against
Tay-Sachs Disease 14
chapter two
Risky Business in White America:
Gene Therapy and Other Ventures in the
Treatment of Cystic Fibrosis 61
chapter three
A Perilous Lottery for the Black Family:
Sickle Cells, Social Justice, and the New
Therapeutic Gamble 116
conclusion
Dreams amid Diversity 161
Notes 175
Glossary 223
Index 237
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acknowledgments
This book is the product of an extended collaboration between the authors. It grew out of a study of the complex
issues raised by gene therapy—a project funded by the Ethical,
Legal, and Social Issues (ELSI) Research Program of the National
Human Genome Research Institute. Many people share credit for
helping this investigation evolve into its current form. In the initial stages, our ELSI co-investigators at the University of North
Carolina Chapel Hill provided crucial insight. We are especially indebted to Larry Churchill and Nancy King in the Department of
Social Medicine and Myra Collins in the Department of Pathology.
Since those beginnings, the book has evolved thanks to the
support of two extraordinary organizations. The James S. McDonnell Foundation Centennial Fellowship in the History of Science
awarded to Keith Wailoo in 1999 helped expand the scope of the
work by fitting the stories of cystic fibrosis, Tay-Sachs, and sickle
cell disease into the broader context of racial politics, pain, and
the politics of biomedicine in twentieth-century America. The
McDonnell Fellowship underwrote a series of cross-disciplinary
workshops on these topics and allowed the authors to continue
their collaboration in their moves from the University of North
Carolina to new positions at Rutgers, the State University of New
Jersey. A Robert Wood Johnson Investigator Award in Health Policy for Keith Wailoo furthered those dimensions of this research
dealing with problems of ethnicity, race, and pain.
Together, the McDonnell Foundation and the Robert Wood
Johnson Foundation helped create a rich research environment in
which the energies and insights of many colleagues and research
assistants were brought to the cultural study of disease and the
biomedical sciences. Sincere thanks to the following research assistants: Ann Kakaliourous, Reggie Pearson, Moshe Usadi, and
Rachel Watkins at UNC; and Curt Cardwell, Joseph Gabriel, Carolina Giraldo, William Gordon, Justin Lorts, Rachel McLaughlin,
Richard Mizelle, Khalil Muhammad, Dominique Padurano, Jane
Park, Stefani Pfeiffer, Michele Rotunda, Lauren Waxman, and
Christine Zemla at Rutgers.
Many others provided valuable commentary on individual chapters or crucial suggestions regarding the book as a whole. At an
early stage, Allan Brandt and Michael Knowles offered key insights, and Charles Rosenberg and Julie Livingston were astute
readers as the book evolved. When the project neared completion,
we benefited from the valuable critique and suggestions of Gerald
Grob, Alison Isenberg, Jay Kaufman, Samantha Kelly, David Mechanic, Sandy Sufian, and Moshe Usadi. Editorial guidance from
Jacqueline Wehmueller at the Johns Hopkins University Press, as
well as the expert advice of copy editor Mary Yates and two outside readers, extended the range and clarity of the book.
Finally, hearty thanks to Keith Wailoo’s colleagues in the Institute for Health, Health Care Policy, and Aging Research and in the
Department of History at Rutgers, New Brunswick, and to Stephen
Pemberton’s colleagues in the Federated Department of History
at the New Jersey Institute of Technology and Rutgers, Newark,
for creating the intellectually vibrant communities in which this
project flourished.
[viii] Acknowledgments
The
Troubled
Dream of
Genetic
Medicine
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introduction
Ethnic Symbols in Conflicted Times
Why do controversies over race become attached,
as they often do, to discussions of modern genetics? How do innovations in genetics and medicine become entangled with problems of ethnicity and disease disparities across groups? This book
offers answers and historical perspective on the frequent collision
between medical innovation and problems of race and ethnicity
in America.
For better or worse, tensions between innovation and ethnicity
have been with us for decades, and they have been a particularly
potent force in the histories of three diseases and the people most
often afflicted by them: Tay-Sachs disease (TSD) and Jewish Americans, cystic fibrosis (CF) and Caucasians, and sickle cell disease
(SCD) and African Americans.1 These three diseases are much
more than personal crises; they are topics of biological fascination
and crucibles of social debate. And for American society at large
their stories frame broad questions about the meaning of race
and ethnicity, about the promise of innovation, about the ability
of diverse groups to shape healthy futures for themselves, and
about who among us believes in the promise of the coming genetics revolution, who demurs, and who is best positioned to benefit from it. At one time or another each malady has stood out as
an exemplary racial or ethnic concern while also representing the
promise of genetic medicine. At frequent intervals over the years,
technical discussions about these diseases—about their prevention, detection, and treatment—have spiraled into broader social
controversies. And so, in the stories of these diseases we can see
the fault lines and divisions in American society itself.
As we enter the age of genetic medicine, increasing knowl-
edge of the human genome and genetic diseases thrusts new dilemmas of technology, ethics, and social justice into the public
spotlight with increasing urgency.2 At every turn, new therapies
and diagnostic advances emerge and the possibility of conquering
disease comes into view. Media reports and professional studies
recite the promise in a steady drumbeat. Genetics in our time
will have powerful implications for all humanity. Already, certain
tests (such as tests for the breast cancer genes BRCA1 and BRCA2)
hold out the possibility of identifying high-risk genes carried in
people’s bodies, genes that decades later may produce cancer.
Such tests promise all Americans that early action may prevent the
disease, but they also raise unsettling ethical and social dilemmas
across a diverse nation.
Different people—women, men, physicians, entrepreneurs,
and members of diverse ethnic groups—take the promise of genetic medicine to mean different things. For women who test positive for BRCA1 and BRCA2, for example, preventive mastectomy has
become one of the most controversial options. Not surprisingly,
physicians and ethicists are troubled by such choices, perplexed
by the idea of removing healthy breasts because of a gene associated with a ‘‘risk’’ of future disease. At the same time, entrepreneurs have generated a great deal of hype about the gene therapy enterprise, which was once described as ‘‘bottling the stuff of
dreams.’’ As early as 1985, headlines in Business Week were suggesting that ‘‘gene doctors [were] on the verge of curing life’s cruelest
diseases.’’ 3 But here too the results have been mixed, and the implications have been varied. Different groups have responded to
the hype differently—some regarding the entrepreneurs, the venture capitalists, and the high expectations with suspicion, others
wholeheartedly embracing the promise of breakthrough medicine. These differences are rooted in profoundly divergent cultural
perspectives about technology, business, and the promise of innovation—perspectives that overlap in compelling ways with ideologies of race and ethnicity. What accounts for the different kinds of
promises made by boosters of genetic medicine to African Ameri[2] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
cans, Jewish Americans, and Anglo-Americans? What accounts
for the different ways in which diverse groups have perceived the
hype, interpreted the message, and experienced the effects of the
genetics revolution? As genetic medicine continually pushes into
new terrain, there is a pressing need to study the moment and
chart a course that recognizes the risks and rewards of these innovations for Americans across a wide social spectrum.4
Such questions, considered historically, take us to the heart
of vexing controversies in race and ethnicity. How could Linus
Pauling, one of the pioneers of the genetics revolution, suggest in
the late 1960s that ‘‘there should be tattooed on the forehead of
every young person a symbol showing possession of the sickle-cell
gene or whatever similar gene’’? How could Francis Collins, the director of the National Human Genome Project, in the early 1990s
characterize an Ultra-Orthodox Jewish plan to prevent births of
babies with Tay-Sachs disease, cystic fibrosis, and other genetic
diseases as a ‘‘moderate nightmare’’ when only a few years earlier
many experts had hailed similar programs as successful models? 5
And what did it mean for the genetics revolution that each of these
diseases had a racial cast and that cystic fibrosis was widely discussed as a ‘‘Caucasian disease’’ at the same time that gene therapy was emerging as a powerful dream? 6 Such questions lie at the
heart of this book. The answers shed light on the role of race in
modern genetics and the sweeping cultural meanings attached to
genetic medicine in our time.
Why place these three diseases at the center of the story of
modern genetic medicine? In the mind-set of modern genetic
medicine, Tay-Sachs disease, cystic fibrosis, and sickle cell disease are related to each other in one way: they are all hereditary
diseases, passed from parents to offspring by a similar process
of transmission.7 This similarity has allowed many people to regard them as parallel maladies, leading even scientists to think
that efforts to treat them should have a common focus: a genebased strategy of cure. But the similarity ends there, because these
maladies also have strikingly different biological, social, and culIntroduction: Ethnic Symbols in Conflicted Times [3]
tural profiles. The first disorder, TSD, is a rapidly degenerative, invariably fatal childhood disorder that has come to be associated
with Jews of Ashkenazic descent. CF is a malady with higher life
expectancy, but it is still often deadly and has come to be associated with Caucasian people of European descent. Finally, SCD is
a disease associated with recurrent pain and high childhood mortality in people of African descent. Efforts to manage these diseases have resulted in diverse social controversies, each reflecting
much about the group involved and about specific aspects of illness as experienced by patients, their families, and their communities. In the case of TSD, the suffering of children and parents has
often been understood against a broader backdrop of Ashkenazic
Jewish history and of Jewish suffering and survival: in the early
1980s, for example, one brochure warning Jewish parents about
TSD was ‘‘printed in blue and white, the colors of the Jewish prayer
shawl and of the flag of Israel.’’ 8 Against such a powerful cultural
backdrop, it becomes easy to grasp how genetic information can
become entangled with the survival of communities. The histories of CF and white people and of SCD as an important AfricanAmerican concern follow quite different trajectories, and yet they
too suggest the potent links between disease, genetic knowledge,
and group identity.9
As these case histories make clear, genetic medicine is neither
monolithic nor uniform. It emerges in diverse arenas, carried out
by a wide array of specialists: neurologists in TSD, pulmonologists in CF, and hematologists in SCD, as well as oncologists, surgeons, and many others. Each specialty group, as we shall see, has
its own agendas for putting genetics to use. Each has pursued the
business opportunities of genetic medicine in different ways, and
each has developed its own sensibilities about the cultural issues
surrounding these diseases and the groups affected by them. One
hematologist in 2003 could portray the hype surrounding imminent cures as a disservice to sickle cell patients, while a pediatric
pulmonary disease specialist working with cystic fibrosis patients
could promise in 1992 that ‘‘in the next decade, we are going to
[4] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
see a revolution in the treatment for this disease.’’ 10 Such professional diversity has shaped not only the histories of these diseases
but also cultural ideas about the promise of genetics. To understand these diverse investments, one must look closely at the practitioners who rally around these diseases, at their interests and
professional debates, at their therapeutic conundrums, and at the
social, ethical, and economic issues that have confronted them as
well as patients and families.
The hype surrounding innovations like gene therapy is fueled
by a powerful notion that has defined American medicine for much
of the past century: the notion that we are always on the verge of a
major breakthrough in the treatment of deadly disease. The cases
examined here are replete with variations on this recurring theme,
gene therapy being only the most recent chapter of the familiar
drama. We evaluate the promise of ‘‘breakthrough’’ medicines,
and a wide range of other sensibilities about the genetics revolution, by looking closely at how innovations have performed in
past struggles against disease. How is it that antibiotics could one
day be at the forefront of the battle against cystic fibrosis yet only
a few years later be perceived as a profound problem for CF sufferers? Was bone marrow transplantation the savior of sickle cell
patients and their families, or was it a dangerous gamble, a highstakes lottery in the world of medical innovation? Whether or not
people buy the idea that we are on the verge of a breakthrough depends on the values they bring to such questions; it also hinges on
whether they encounter health problems as patients and families,
as medical practitioners, or as entrepreneurs.
As disorders of a genetic and ethnic ‘‘nature,’’ these maladies
have inspired intense and conflicted discussions over the decades.
They have become subjects for high-profile legislation. In the
1970s the spotlight fell on sickle cell disease, on Tay-Sachs, and
on such other diseases as thalassemia (a hereditary blood disease
common among people from the Mediterranean—Greek, Italian,
Israeli, and so on). As Congress pondered legislation to address
these ethnic concerns, some suggested that this was simply ‘‘speIntroduction: Ethnic Symbols in Conflicted Times [5]
cial treatment’’ for the newest ‘‘ethnic disease of the month.’’
Within a few years, however, white Americans would have their
own genetic disease to embrace: as if in response to the rising profile of these other maladies, cystic fibrosis came to be portrayed
as ‘‘the white version of sickle cell disease.’’ 11 Each disease, from
time to time, has been an exemplar of both the best uses and
the worst misuses of hereditary knowledge and genetic manipulation. They became potent sites for debates about family planning,
religious values, and state intervention in the shaping of ethnic,
racial, and communal identity. Not surprisingly, they also inspired
fierce social controversy about the importance of autonomy and
self-determination. In the shadow of these disorders, intense discussions would flare about the risks and benefits of innovative
diagnosis and therapy and about whether genetics promoted or
hindered the pursuit of social justice.
In the annals of medicine, these three diseases stand out as
ethnic symbols for our time. As sociologist Herbert Gans noted
in 1979, ethnicity was in transition in the late twentieth century.
‘‘Ethnicity may be turning into symbolic ethnicity,’’ he said, ‘‘an
ethnicity of last resort, which could, nevertheless, persist for generations.’’ Gans observed that third- and fourth-generation ethnic
immigrants in 1970s America had not erased their ethnic identity;
nor, however, did they belong to ethnic neighborhoods, political organizations, or institutions, as had their predecessors. Their
ethnicity was expressed more and more in symbols that had been
given greater importance precisely because of the diversification
and dispersion of formerly tightly knit communities. For example,
Gans argued, once-minor rites of passage like the Bar Mitzvah
acquired growing symbolic significance for Jews trying to maintain their ethnic and religious identity in the face of pressures for
cultural assimilation.12 Similar processes explain how Tay-Sachs
disease acquired broader cultural significance as a Jewish disease
problem in this era. The politics of symbolic ethnicity also inform discussions about sickle cell disease in relation to AfricanAmerican identity and, on a subtler and often unrecognized level,
[6] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
shape medical and social ideas about the Caucasian disorder cystic fibrosis. With Gans’s observations in mind, this book explores
the ways in which therapeutic discussions that appear to be fundamentally about issues of biology and laboratory science are deeply
enmeshed with questions of Jewish, white, and black identity in
late-twentieth-century America.
Chapter by chapter, we move from Tay-Sachs disease to cystic
fibrosis to sickle cell disease in a dialectical fashion. In chapter 1
the focus on TSD highlights the overarching role of Jewish identity
politics and the struggle for Jewish self-preservation in shaping
genetic medicine. In chapter 2, which focuses on CF, we describe
the central role of therapeutic innovators and entrepreneurs in the
story. Here, ethnic cultural issues play a far less obvious role. Yet
as we shall see, white ethnicity—a symbolic amalgam of a wide
range of historically diverse ethnicities—has been a powerful, if
sometimes invisible, force in shaping public understandings of
CF and genetic medicine. Then in chapter 3 we see how powerful
ethnic dynamics combine with the drive toward therapeutic innovation in the history of SCD. This chapter describes the complex
cultural entanglement of genetic medicine with the struggle for
racial justice and fairness. We call attention to these themes because they arise out of the literature itself, and because they have
played such defining roles in the histories of these disorders.
The conflicted and difficult history of genetics with regard to
questions of race and ethnicity also casts its shadow in these accounts. In the early twentieth century, many hereditary scientists
promoted the idea of the ‘‘inferiority’’ of black people and ethnic
minorities. Tay-Sachs disease started its history with the label Jewish amaurotic idiocy. Following World War II and the Holocaust, and
in the wake of the close links between eugenics and Nazi atrocities, geneticists distanced themselves from this eugenicist past
and its notions of racial hierarchy and inferiority. The new genetics took a decidedly clinical turn, seeking to employ genetic
knowledge not for social division and stereotyping but for improvements in the diagnosis and treatment of disease. Since its
Introduction: Ethnic Symbols in Conflicted Times [7]
advent in the post–World War II years, genetic medicine has developed a more complicated relationship to questions of race and
ethnicity.13 As Diane Paul has argued, medical specialists who
sought to eliminate disease genes had to demarcate their efforts
sharply from past eugenic policies that targeted ethnic and religious minorities and the poor. Thus by 1968 one medical geneticist could say, ‘‘Eugenic goals are most likely to be attained under
a name other than eugenics.’’ 14
The histories of Tay-Sachs disease, cystic fibrosis, and sickle
cell disease reveal how the purported connections between disease and racial identity have been continually reworked to mesh
with current politics, opinions, and social relations. At every turn,
despite the biological impression of these categories, notions of
‘‘Jewishness,’’ ‘‘whiteness,’’ and ‘‘blackness’’ have thoroughly infiltrated the public and professional discussions about these maladies. Some biologists and social scientists assert, of course, that
these are socially constructed terms rather than biological ones.15
They stress that the long history of intermarriage and genetic
exchange—between whites and blacks in America and between
Jews of many regions and others—makes meaningless any claims
about absolute genetic differences.16 The same criticism holds for
the category white, for it too is an amalgam of multiple regional,
biological, and genetic identities from across the globe, evolving
through complex patterns of intermarriage over time. Moreover,
terms like Jewish that once connoted a profound biological and
racial difference have changed their meaning in America. With
intermarriage across groups, with a complex diaspora, and with
a tendency to emphasize the cultural and religious meaning of
Jewishness, biological notions have been pushed into the recesses
of the historical past.
Race and ethnicity remain contentious topics in American cultural and political discourse, and the complexity and malleability
of these terms have continued to confound us. Depending on
where any commentator stands at any particular moment, Americans are capable of embracing any number of beliefs about race.
[8] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
Some are comfortable referring to black people as a ‘‘race’’ despite
long histories of cross-cultural contact and intermarriage and scientific arguments suggesting the meaninglessness of the concept.
For others, white is a broad cultural category with powerful social
resonance, even though white people might hail from many different regions and biological pasts. Some would insist, nevertheless, that white could indeed be understood as a biological label.
The term Caucasian, even more than white, has been used to connote a biological identity along racial lines even though the term
takes its actual meaning from a specific geographical reference—
the people of the Caucasus region—that has bears little on American whiteness.17 And what about Jewish Americans? In popular
thought today, according to author Karen Brodkin (in stark contrast to one hundred years ago, for example), Jewish people are
white. Yet Jewish people are often described in terms of ethnicity
and religion (Orthodox, Conservative, Reform, secular). Adding
to the complexity, terms like Ashkenazic and Sephardic introduce a
biological element, pointing to the historical coherence of particular Jewish communities in Europe and Africa. The malleability,
and the overlapping, of all these terms is striking. Black and African
American (as well as the outmoded colored ) also point not merely to
changing conventions of naming people but to different boundaries around the group. Whereas African American stands in parallel
to other ethnic identifiers, pointing to an African diaspora, black is
at once more inclusive of all dark-skinned peoples and at the same
time, in the American context, freighted with a history of derogation and insult as well as more recent connotations of pride and
resistance. Despite the obvious fungibility of these terms, there
remains a striking urge to treat these categories as timeless and
concrete. This multiplicity of options—indeed, the very malleability of race as a category—has often swirled beneath the surface
of discussions about Tay-Sachs disease, cystic fibrosis, and sickle
cell disease. Our goal is to make visible the cultural meanings that,
whether acknowledged or not, have attached themselves to these
diseases.
Introduction: Ethnic Symbols in Conflicted Times [9]
Regardless of the historical and social complexities of race
thinking, notions of biological blackness, whiteness, and Jewishness continue to have powerful cultural salience, and these three
diseases operate as telling reminders of this assertion. For laypersons and professionals, for doctors and patients, for those who
identify with these labels and those who don’t, Tay-Sachs disease,
cystic fibrosis, and sickle cell disease stand as powerful indices
of the stubborn persistence of biological difference. Since their
emergence into broader social discourse, they have served as symbolic vehicles for thinking about race and ethnicity in America. It
is therefore no accident that these diseases should inform an everwidening range of discussions: about therapy, about justice and
fairness, about group identity, about the possibilities of genetic
transformation, about the wisdom of screening and prevention,
and about the promises and perils of innovation. What can Americans—whether black, white, Jewish, Asian, Latino, Native American, or other—expect from the genetics revolution? How do ideas
about ethnicity become attached to disease and other symbols
of suffering? This comparative historical study offers accounts of
how these linkages are forged, and of how rich and often contradictory associations between race, ethnicity, and innovation flourish in the age of genetic medicine.
Although this book touches on many of the wrenching personal issues that emerge in the fight against disease, it should
not be mistaken for an account of patients and families. Such
an undertaking would involve detailed interviews, ethnographic
study, and access to patient records over the decades as well as
access to a broader range of personal narratives of illness than currently exists.18 We base our analysis of these genetic disease histories almost entirely on published sources: written opinions, medical studies, and public commentary in various types of media. For
us, the debates that appear in the pages of popular media like Time
magazine and the San Francisco Chronicle, medical journals like Blood
and the New England Journal of Medicine, and numerous other outlets,
from Discover magazine to congressional hearings and law jour[10] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
nals, provide powerful insight into the far-reaching cultural meanings of disease. The choice is deliberate, for we are fundamentally
interested in the public face of these maladies and the ways in
which this public record shapes the cultural meaning of disease.
These sources reveal the constant play of group identity in the cultural, medical, and scientific imagination about these archetypal
maladies. Of course, the way we tell this story is not entirely distinct from a patient’s and family’s perspective. For people with
these disorders and their families, the issues of how other people
have perceived their condition and portrayed it, how such actors
have built investments in their experience, and how these interests have evolved over time must command significant attention,
for these issues allow us to grasp more fully the plight of patients.
To be sure, in our society the fine-grained ideas and symbols
that physicians and scientists generate in their clinics and laboratories communicate broadly and powerfully beyond those milieus.
Using editorials, clinical studies, conference reports, and a wide
range of popular media, we delve into questions about how writers
have understood the therapeutic challenge, and into the cultural
ideals of betterment, the remaking of bodies and selves, and social
transformation. In these sources we discern popular ideas about
how patients, families, and doctors define amelioration. Relief,
we find, depends on issues such as the socioeconomics and nature of family life, the place of the family in their community and
in the medical system, and the place of religion in people’s lives.
Ideas about therapy even depend on the politics of legislation and
research funding and the vagaries of how the pharmaceutical industry develops products and markets the idea of better living
through drugs.
In the early 1990s the genetics revolution seemed to be in its
brilliant infancy, the promise of gene therapy shone brightly, and
the puzzle of genetic disease seemed on the verge of being solved,
at least in the thinking of many physicians and patients. In focusing our analysis in part on these years, we seek to pause and reflect on events that have moved with bewildering speed and moIntroduction: Ethnic Symbols in Conflicted Times [11]
mentum. The year 1993, for example, was one in which cystic
fibrosis researcher Ronald Crystal confronted early setbacks in the
effort to test CF gene therapy and sought to scale back on his earlier promises, insisting that ‘‘to think that we’re going to have a
cure . . . in a year is naïve.’’ It was also the year in which Time
magazine suggested that ‘‘a flavor enhancer may provide the first
treatment for sickle cell anemia’’ because of its ability to ‘‘wake
up genes.’’ 19 Discoveries and claims came fast and furious in the
early 1990s, and many commentators portrayed genetic disease as
a solvable jigsaw puzzle in which the missing pieces were finally
falling into place. Some observers feared, however, that technological progress was rapidly outpacing society’s ability to sort out
the good from the bad and to make informed ethical choices about
how to use these new tools. With informed hindsight, we begin
to see more clearly that genetic medicine was traveling not one
path, but many. In this era, the stories of Tay-Sachs prevention,
gene therapy for cystic fibrosis, and the perilous lottery for sickle
cell patients suggested that the genetics revolution had brought
these patients to three different crossroads, and that the promise
of genetic manipulation of disease intersected with deeply held
cultural views about risk and risk-taking. Each disease in its own
way raised profound questions about how therapy was related to
group identity and to the pursuit of social justice in America. In
the pages that follow we seek to illuminate how these three apparently similar ‘‘ethnic’’ genetic maladies could have followed such
different trajectories in the early 1990s, when the promise and
peril of genetic medicine seemed clearly in view.
Diseases have powerful symbolic significance, both for the
people identified with them and for society at large. One need only
point to AIDS and its intersection with gay culture and politics,
breast cancer as a women’s disease, and prostate cancer as a male
problem to get a sense of the profound relationship between disease symbolism and group identity.20 In the case of a deadly infectious disease like AIDS, the symbolism became politically charged
[12] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
for those inside the circle of suffering in gay communities, and
for those outside as well. With breast cancer, a particularly gendered body politics shaped the public meaning of the disease. And
prostate cancer activists in recent years have attempted to build on
these trends by linking a sense of male identity to what was once a
little-known disease. As these examples suggest, disease symbolism serves many functions for insiders and outsiders, feeding into
personal and community politics or playing a role on the larger
social and political stage.
In the American context, genetic disease and genetic advances
insert themselves squarely into the cultural politics and symbolism of family and community. In AIDS, breast cancer, and prostate cancer, as in Tay-Sachs, cystic fibrosis, and sickle cell disease, the politics of identity collides with biological theory, and
the promise of genetic innovation becomes entangled with problems of justice, marketing, and hype. Families and entire communities, bound together by common ancestry, cultural heritage, and
ethnic identity, are finding that they have high stakes in the rise of
genetic medicine.21 Innovations in the definition of disease often
compel families to think of themselves differently, to rethink their
relations with one another, and even to alter their behavior. Such
a scenario was dramatized in the 1997 film Twilight of the Golds,
about a woman carrying a fetus with a supposed ‘‘gay gene’’ and
the family’s intense conflict about whether to abort and what it
would mean to bring such a child into the world. Although the
film dwells purely in the realm of fiction, it draws our attention to
the types of conflicts and dilemmas encountered and imagined by
modern-day Americans, and it highlights the cultural narratives,
the promises, and the pitfalls that have unfolded in recent decades
around Tay-Sachs disease, cystic fibrosis, and sickle cell disease.
Introduction: Ethnic Symbols in Conflicted Times [13]
1
Eradicating a ‘‘Jewish Gene’’
promise and pitfalls in the fight
against tay-sachs disease
Since its discovery in the 1880s, Tay-Sachs disease
(TSD) has always been experienced by parents as a tragic pathology, an inevitable downward spiral affecting very young children. One mother described the experience this way in the 1980s:
At first her baby Ian appeared to be developing quite happily.
He showed all the signs of normal infant development, only to
begin missing a few developmental milestones. Motor skills he
had gained early in life suddenly went into decline. Soon doctors
diagnosed Ian with TSD, and his mother wrote, ‘‘Month 12—cannot lift head when lying on abdomen; likes bath.’’ The following
months brought the child a wave of problems—an increasing loss
of respiratory function, seizures, reduced interactions with the
outside world, and life-threatening infections:
Month 16—mucus increasing—started postural drainage . . .
month 17—we bought suction machine . . . month 19—started
tube feeding . . . month 24—seizes, vocalizes, grins, twitches
(ironic that he looks so adorable, so ‘‘alive’’ during seizures);
no other expression . . . month 25—I think he hears . . . month
27—has pneumonia—hospitalized eight days . . . month 29—
coughs well but not enough . . . month 31—started antibiotic
injections today . . . back in hospital for pneumonia; month
32—home after 22 days . . . breathing very slow . . . feeding
difficult.
Just short of Ian’s third birthday, the sad and inevitable end came:
Month 33—his lips do not move when we kiss him as they did
last month . . . month 34—stopped breathing during feeding
on the 3rd . . . Ian was gone.1
Here was a powerful family drama, a narrative of relentless decline that would shape sensibilities not only about Tay-Sachs disease but also about ways to alleviate suffering in a wider range of
genetic disorders.
Throughout much of the history of TSD (and still today), this
course of decline for children with the disorder has remained unchanged. No breakthrough treatments or miracle cures could alter
this inexorable decline, and until the 1970s, none were expected.
Parents like Ian’s mother hoped only for supportive care during
the inevitable death of their child, and the intense experience
of witnessing the decline of formerly healthy babies has overwhelmingly shaped how doctors and families think about therapy.2
The personal chronicle of the tragic deterioration and emotional burden of the Tay-Sachs child was a story that over the years
became increasingly linked to the story of Jewish life and culture.
The public history of Tay-Sachs disease has focused, therefore,
not merely on generic parental suffering but on a particular kind
of anguish: that of the Jewish parent. Because of the disease’s historically high prevalence in Ashkenazic Jews, the medical conversation—about how to treat the child, how and whether to prevent such births, and how to eradicate such suffering—has taken
on a particular cultural, ethical, and even religious significance.
The symbolic connection between Tay-Sachs and Jewish people
has made ethnicity and culture a prominent if not central concern
shaping the promise of medical innovation.
Beginning in the late nineteenth century, a time of extensive
migration for Eastern European Jews to new regions around the
globe including North America, experts associated the disease
with people they assumed to be a separate ‘‘race.’’ 3 Characterized as ‘‘Jewish amaurotic idiocy’’ in the late nineteenth and early
Eradicating a ‘‘Jewish Gene’’: Tay-Sachs Disease [15]
twentieth centuries, by the 1950s Tay-Sachs had been classified as
a type of lipid storage disorder, a disease stemming from an abnormal buildup of fats in the body that can affect any one of numerous organ systems.4 It was also often described as a lysosomal
storage disorder, calling attention to the particular subcellular
features of the storage pathology.5 Other researchers have understood the disease in yet different scientific terms—as one of the
‘‘gangliosidoses’’ or the ‘‘cerebral sphingolipidoses,’’ a framework
that highlights the particular location of the lipid storage pathology in the neurons of the brain.6 Each of these characterizations,
starting with ‘‘Jewish amaurotic idiocy,’’ has had important implications for how physicians, patients, researchers, and others have
understood the core issues in the disease, and each has had important implications for framing possible approaches to therapy.
By the late 1960s and 1970s, scientific understanding had produced no effective treatment for Tay-Sachs disease, but advances
had emerged in the realm of better diagnosis and prevention.
In the absence of therapeutic gains, prevention had immediate
and irresistible appeal for many of the Jewish families at risk for
having babies with TSD. Beginning in the 1970s, American Jews
embraced a wide range of newly available techniques to prevent
the birth of Tay-Sachs babies. Among the novel methods used
were mass genetic testing and reproductive counseling. If both
members of a couple were found to be carriers, they might decide
not to have children, or to take the chance—knowing the risks.
Where prenatal genetic testing of fetuses was done, many American Jews chose to abort TSD fetuses. The results since the 1970s
have been dramatic: the gradual decline of TSD among Jews living
in the United States, and in many communities even its total eradication. In a relatively short time, TSD had been transformed into
a modern genetic success story.7 The number of family tragedies
like Ian’s was dramatically reduced.
As a strategy for disease prevention, the Jewish struggle against
Tay-Sachs disease became exemplary, for it highlighted how modern genetics could support the value of ethnic self-determination
[16] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
in the modern era. Speaking in early 2003, one Stanford University
population geneticist proclaimed that ‘‘Jews have taken charge of
the information about diseases more common in Ashkenazis (i.e.,
Eastern European) and now accepted its usefulness.’’ 8 Such comments drew attention to the fact that the success of this mode
of disease prevention depended upon American Jews’ embrace
of the idea of genetic counseling, abortion, and other methods.
They organized testing campaigns in colleges and religious institutions, encouraging unmarried people and potential marriage
partners to find out if they carried the gene for TSD, and they
warned couples who both carried the gene about the risk of conceiving a TSD baby (25% in each child). With some variations,
Jews in Israel, Europe, and other parts of the world have also embraced this model. Thus, the decline of TSD among Jews in the
1970s, 1980s, and 1990s became an exemplar—until recently, at
least—of the proper uses of genetic information in the name of
self-preservation and communal health.
One of the major factors in the success of prevention has been
the role of rabbis, religious leaders, and scientists in developing
innovative techniques to spread information about the disease,
and their role in shaping its meaning for diverse Jewish people.
As suggested above, another motivating force has been the idea
of Jewish self-preservation, which has played a compelling role
for many Jews in shaping the practice of counseling, reproductive decision making, and making sure that fewer babies with TSD
are born.9 Of course, Jewish signifies not one but many different
kinds of group identity. Increasingly the term Jewish evokes diverse religious communities and various cultural and secular practices. Some even argue that in recent decades American Jews have
emerged as another ‘‘white’’ ethnic group.10 Indeed, as efforts to
bring TSD under control unfolded, this diversity in social conditions and identities among Jews was thrown into relief.
Diverse Jewish groups achieved dramatic successes in preventing the births of children with Tay-Sachs disease in an era
when political and technological developments supported their
Eradicating a ‘‘Jewish Gene’’: Tay-Sachs Disease [17]
efforts.11 As one Orthodox rabbi put it recently, ‘‘Today, Tay-Sachs
is almost non-existent in New York’s orthodox community, and in
Israel too. In the 1970s, the 16 bed Tay-Sachs ward in New York’s
Kingsbrook Jewish Medical Center was filled to capacity. Since
1996, the ward has had no Tay-Sachs patients.’’ 12 As professional
and media reports stated, genetic counselors, physicians, and rabbis worked together with family members in close-knit communities to avoid tragedy after tragedy. Political and social changes in
the 1970s were also crucial to this success. Only then did selective
abortion become increasingly feasible with the growing legalization of abortion. Amid frank pessimism about the possibilities of
a cure, prevention of the disease by abortion was often characterized as ‘‘therapeutic.’’ Indeed, the use of the term therapeutic abortion to describe the process reveals much about the era’s liberalization of access to abortion and the shaping of such innovations
by the cultural and social context of that time.13 Even so, many
Jews found therapeutic abortion to be an unacceptable means of
TSD prevention.
Among some Jewish communities with strong religious proscriptions against abortion, these innovative methods could not
be endorsed—and out of this tension the Dor Yeshorim was
born. According to the Ultra-Orthodox view, abortion was just as
tragic an outcome as Tay-Sachs itself. Other approaches would
be needed, and this is why a new practice, the Dor Yeshorim, appeared in the 1980s. Dor Yeshorim (meaning ‘‘generation of the
righteous’’ or ‘‘upright generation’’) initially emerged as a preferred strategy to combat TSD among some Ultra-Orthodox Jewish groups in New York and Chicago. It involved the testing of
adolescent children within the religious community to determine
whether they were carriers of the TSD gene. The practice was promoted as a new religious rite of passage, and adolescents found
to be carriers would be restricted from marrying other carriers.
Such restrictions ensured that the disease would never appear in
their offspring. Rabbi Josef Ekstein of Brooklyn, New York, created Dor Yeshorim in 1983. Dor Yeshorim soon spread to other
[18] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
congregations in New York, in England, and in Israel, and it has
since become a service available to high school and university students as well as a range of other young Jews judged to be marriageable. The fact that arranged marriage was already commonplace
in many Orthodox communities made the innovation widely appealing, even logical.
The success of the Dor Yeshorim stood out, particularly in contrast with the toll that Tay-Sachs disease continued to take in a
few other ethnic minority communities. In the early 1990s, just as
the Dor Yeshorim emerged into a harsher spotlight, the upsurge
in popular and professional awareness of Tay-Sachs also indicated
that incidence of the disease was rising, not falling, in several nonJewish communities, including French Canadians, Pennsylvania
Dutch, and various Franco-American groups. In significant contrast with American Jews, the Franco-American religious community of New Hampshire was portrayed in media accounts not as a
model for the local fight against genetic disease but as a persistent
enclave of ignorance. One article noted, ‘‘Some researchers worry
that a lack of information about the possible risk, plus ethnic
pride and opposition to abortion, could keep New Hampshire’s
predominantly Catholic Franco-Americans from getting tested for
the gene that causes the enzyme deficiency.’’ 14 At the same time,
the increased prevalence of the disorder in rural Louisiana fed
into negative stereotypes about Cajuns. These were, of course, precisely the kinds of stereotypes about ethnicity and disease that
some Ultra-Orthodox rabbis had encountered. In Louisiana, TSD
became widely perceived as ‘‘the Cajun disease,’’ a disorder that
produced ‘‘lazy babies’’ and refocused attention on cultural stereotypes of Cajuns as ‘‘people who marry among themselves.’’ 15 Such
social portraits of Tay-Sachs in different parts of America—as part
of the ‘‘bloodlines of the region’’ in Louisiana, as part of Catholic
Franco-American culture in New Hampshire—highlight not only
how the meaning assigned to the disease would depend upon the
nature of community politics but also how the community’s response could stigmatize the community itself. Against this backEradicating a ‘‘Jewish Gene’’: Tay-Sachs Disease [19]
drop, the Dor Yeshorim model of prevention would be hailed as
a success. But clearly it would not find acceptance in many other
locales.
By the early 1990s, the success story of the Dor Yeshorim took
a dramatic, and some would say unfortunate, turn. As scientists
produced more and more information about the genetic basis
of many other diseases and about their prevalence in Jews, and
as talk of more and more ‘‘Jewish genetic diseases’’ appeared in
news accounts, it seemed prudent to incorporate new tests for genetic diseases into the Dor Yeshorim. Controversy quickly arose
when Rabbi Ekstein and others advocated expanding the practice to test for and prevent marriage among carriers of genes for
(among other disorders) cystic fibrosis and Gaucher’s disease. Indeed, the inclusion of these two particular diseases drew attention to the fact that the Dor Yeshorim existed in a narrow ethical borderland, and that by spilling over from preventing a fatal
‘‘Jewish disease’’ to preventing other less deadly maladies, the program ran the risk of putting life with a chronic but manageable
condition in the same category as life with Tay-Sachs. Since control rested firmly in the hands of the rabbi and families, geneticists could only complain, as did Michael Kaback, that the use of
genetic screening to prevent manageable as opposed to fatal diseases threatened to transform what had once been seen as enlightened self-determination into an assault on self-determination and
on genetic and human diversity. Kaback noted that the decision
to target less deadly maladies created a problem: ‘‘Every single
human being, you and me too, we have genetic risks for our children, whether it’s cancer, early heart disease, or certain types of
mental illness. I don’t know where this stops, or who makes the
decision where it stops.’’ 16 The expansion of Dor Yeshorim thus
raised a troubling question for many experts in the field. Was this
expansion part of the dream of the new genetic era? Or was it,
as Francis Collins, director of the National Human Genome Research Institute, would assert in 1993, a ‘‘nightmare’’? 17
What forces brought the fight against Tay-Sachs to such a peril[20] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
ous intersection in 1993? In many ways the story of TSD, the Dor
Yeshorim, American Jews, and Gaucher’s disease is a narrative of
clashing values and perspectives in which ideals of genetic selfdetermination intertwined with deeply held religious values and
notions of ethnicity and suffering. The story offers illuminating
insights into the politics of ethnic community and into the promise and perils of community-based management of genetic information. It also reveals how the very meaning of genetic disease varies
by community, place, and time, and how the notion of genetic disease is integrated into broader and historically bound senses of
self, identity, and group. The debate over the Dor Yeshorim highlights an obvious but often unrecognized reality: that genetic diseases are not all the same, either in their natural course or in their
cultural meanings.
Why does the concept of Tay-Sachs resonate with particular
meaning for American Jews and to a lesser extent for those outside
Jewish communities looking in? Only by considering the overall
trajectory of TSD, as well as Gaucher’s disease and (in a later chapter) cystic fibrosis, can we fully understand the tensions that surfaced over the Dor Yeshorim and its expansion, in the early 1990s,
to other genetic diseases.
from ‘‘jewish idiocy’’ to hex-a deficiency
In the 1880s a British ophthalmologist (Warren Tay) and an
American physician (Bernard Sachs) observed some of the crucial
symptoms—the optical degeneration, the arrested cerebral development—that came to define Tay-Sachs disease.18 The two physicians described how a child with Tay-Sachs, apparently normal at
birth and into the first months of life, descended into severe retardation, early blindness, and epileptic seizures, followed by paralysis and death, often from pneumonia, usually by the age of three
or four.19 Little was said about the parents’ perspective, but the
clinical portrait was clear. Because of the slow degeneration, particularly of mental and optical (amaurotic) function, and its apEradicating a ‘‘Jewish Gene’’: Tay-Sachs Disease [21]
pearance multiple times in particular families, Sachs attached the
label amaurotic familial idiocy to the disorder, and that descriptor
persisted well into the twentieth century.20 In the early stages of
this drama of discovery, Sachs (a Jewish physician working among
a large Jewish immigrant population in New York City) acknowledged that the disease was ‘‘almost exclusively observed among
Hebrews.’’ 21 However, he regarded it as a dispersed form of ‘‘familial idiocy,’’ which was merely concentrated in, but not exclusive to, this new population of American Jews.
Scientific developments of the early twentieth century had no
impact on the experience of Tay-Sachs disease; therapy offered
little, but clinical understanding did advance steadily. Research on
the disease in this era produced only an increasingly precise description of what was happening during the decline of infants and
children with TSD. Through the 1930s, 1940s, and 1950s a more
complex clinical and biological portrait of the disease emerged.
By the early 1940s physicians could describe in detail why the infant slowly degenerated: it was apparently because of the excessive accumulation of specific types of lipids (fatty molecules called
gangliosidoses) in particular brain cells.22 They could do very little
to remedy this accumulation or to stop the tragic decline. However, the very notion that they were dealing with a ‘‘brain disorder’’
—rather than, say, ‘‘amaurosis’’ or ‘‘idiocy’’—opened up new lines
of thinking about the distant, futuristic possibilities of therapeutic interventions.
New scientific knowledge provided clues about the linkage between Tay-Sachs and Jewish populations. For example, one important development at midcentury was the awareness that TSD
was not a unique pathology but was part of a class of lipid storage
disorders, and that this larger group was distributed across different populations. By the mid-1960s, researchers had isolated the
subcellular lysosomal particles associated with the accumulation
of lipids, and based on this development TSD could be conceived
of as one among many lysosomal storage disorders.23 Along with
these descriptions of the underlying molecular characteristics of
[22] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
infantile TSD came increasing attempts to provide updated social
profiles for these types of maladies. As a result, TSD’s association
specifically with Ashkenazic Jews—those descended from ancestors in Eastern France, Germany, and Eastern Europe—became a
clear, specific, and powerful linkage. Sephardic Jews (from Spain
and Portugal) and Mizrahim (from Northern Africa) did not experience high levels of this particular lipid storage disease. Researchers employed population studies to establish the relative
prevalence of TSD in Ashkenazic Jews, a link first made in the
early 1930s.24 In subsequent decades and into the 1960s, biologists were breaking down the often monolithic category of Jews
into different lineages, each with its own history, cultural practices, and disease risks.
Was Jewish identity a unitary racial and biological one? Clearly
it was not. In the American context in the 1960s, to speak of
Ashkenazic Jews, rather than Jews in general, was to draw attention to the particular subpopulation within a large, diversifying
group of second- and third-generation American communities.
These Americans were assimilating national cultural practices,
moving to suburbs, giving up formerly intense attachments to the
homeland, to clothing, and to traditional ways of speaking such
as Yiddish. Yet they were also holding on to powerful notions of
religious and cultural distinction. As they negotiated this tension,
the motif of distinctive diseases and distinctive forms of suffering served to provide a powerful common reference point—what
one might call a new form of symbolic ethnicity.
In the late 1960s came a dramatic diagnostic development that
further refined medical and social thinking about Tay-Sachs disease and opened wide the pathway to prevention. TSD had lacked
a high profile before then, and medical scientists had largely ignored it. As one researcher noted, TSD was ‘‘the last of the major
[lipid storage disorders] for which the explicit nature of the metabolic abnormality remained unknown.’’ 25 Knowledge about the
precise nature of the abnormality in Tay-Sachs remained sketchy
through the 1960s, whereas (by contrast) knowledge of underEradicating a ‘‘Jewish Gene’’: Tay-Sachs Disease [23]
lying disease mechanisms in cystic fibrosis, sickle cell disease, and
other genetic disorders had led to well-developed research agendas focusing on both therapeutics and diagnostics.26
A key discovery in 1969 turned the attention of patients and
physicians back to the clinic and to potential treatments: Shintaro
Okada and John O’Brien’s identification of the enzyme responsible for the normal breakdown of lipids, which was missing in
the child with Tay-Sachs disease.27 Before then, the discovery that
a child had TSD usually occurred only when the clinical manifestations appeared—when the neurological and cognitive decline,
mental retardation, and cerebral seizures began, followed by loss
of vision and motor control and death between the ages of two and
six. The identification of the missing Hex-A enzyme made possible
diagnosis of TSD infants before symptoms appeared and opened
up the possibility that fetuses could be diagnosed in utero—and
that abortion could save parents from the anguish of watching
their apparently normal child degenerate and die.28 This advance
prepared the ground for a new image of the disease—one that
Ashkenazic Jews and other afflicted populations could readily embrace.
As these diagnostic events unfolded, biologists were pondering why this gene and disease were concentrated in Ashkenazic
Jewish populations around the world—and they generated many
theories and speculations. Was this prevalence explained by patterns of Jewish intermarriage, they wondered, by the ‘‘ghettoization’’ and intermarriage of Jews in Europe, by the close-knit nature
of such communities, or by some possible survival benefit to parents carrying the gene? The new image of Tay-Sachs disease that
emerged in the 1960s connected new pathological understanding
with notions of a historical Jewish identity. What historical and
social mechanisms could account for the higher frequency of the
gene causing TSD in Ashkenazic Jews than in Sephardic Jews? 29
Among the theories that emerged was the notion that the disease originated from a ‘‘bad gene’’ that had spread by intermarriage, by migration, and by patterns of reproduction among in[24] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
sular Eastern European Jewish communities. There was a great
deal of wild speculation in this literature. One study of TSD, for example, suggested that the disease emerged at the end of the nineteenth century among Russian Jewish immigrants in places like
New York City because ‘‘all these carriers were now concentrated
in one small section of Manhattan Borough—the Lower East Side
—which encompasses an area of about 25 city blocks . . . an even
smaller geographical area than the Pale of Settlement’’ in Russia.30
In some respects the gene was imagined to have its origins in the
repressive social conditions of ghettos in Eastern Europe. Writing for Discover magazine in 1991, geographer Jared Diamond even
speculated that the prevalence of Tay-Sachs among Jews is the result of a genetic ‘‘blessing’’ that protected TSD carriers (heterozygotes) against the tuberculosis that was endemic in the crowded
conditions of the ghettos.31 TSD therefore symbolized a history
of a people’s oppression. In the upsurge in such theories, the disease became a part of the mythos of American Judaism.
As these connections to the Jewish past emerged, new scientific studies simultaneously complicated the clinical picture and
gave cause for therapeutic optimism. It was apparently not exclusively fatal, nor was it confined to infants. Diagnostic advancement in the 1960s and 1970s revealed that the standard portrait
of lipid storage disorders needed revision, for it now seemed that
such ailments ranged from the tragically severe (as in Tay-Sachs
disease) to the unrecognizably mild. Moreover, once TSD was redefined as a Hex-A deficiency, researchers began to identify juveniles and adults with the deficiency who exhibited only some of the
symptoms of classic Tay-Sachs. These other forms of Hex-A deficiency did not fit well with the traditional clinical or ethnic profile of TSD. Hex-A deficiency was not exclusively a lethal disease
of infancy. ‘‘While infantile Tay-Sachs occurs more frequently in
Ashkenazi Jews,’’ noted one researcher, ‘‘the juvenile form of TaySachs has no ethnic predilection.’’ 32 This new subclass of delayed
Hex-A deficiency was, however, usually fatal by the second decade of life. Thus, the development of the Hex-A model of TSD
Eradicating a ‘‘Jewish Gene’’: Tay-Sachs Disease [25]
enlarged the definition of the disease, shifting the social profile
slightly, and, most important, opened up the real possibility of
further extending the life of the patient via enzyme replacement
therapy.
In the 1970s, then, scientific and social developments seemed
to be opening the doors simultaneously to prevention, therapy,
and increased cultural awareness of the deadly disorder. A great
deal had been learned about identifying would-be parents who
had the potential to produce Tay-Sachs children and about identifying TSD in fetuses. A disease once regarded as a kind of feeblemindedness had come to be understood as a brain disease, a lipid
storage disease, and now a deficiency of the Hex-A enzyme. It had
also become clear that TSD was just one of many such disorders,
standing alongside Gaucher’s in a growing array of lipid storage
disorders. The ability to identify TSD carriers and fetuses, combined with broadened access to abortion, fostered the rise of a
preventive approach to TSD. At the same time, a distant hope had
appeared: that the identification of the missing enzyme in TSD
might lead to a more effective therapeutic approach.
the ‘‘failure’’ of enzyme therapy and
the tilt toward prevention
With the identification of the missing enzyme responsible for
Tay-Sachs disease, hope ran high among parents and researchers
that such knowledge would lead to an effective therapy. As Bonnie
Friedman of the Health Services and Mental Health Administration (HSMHA) wrote in 1971, ‘‘With medical science already able
to prevent certain inborn errors of metabolism and hopeful of
correcting others, it may soon be possible to strike many disorders from man’s list of neurological ailments.’’ Throughout the
1970s researchers’ attention would focus not on the disease’s links
to the Jewish past but on the possibility that enzyme replacement therapies would make it a manageable part of the Jewish
future. Friedman concluded, ‘‘With detection and prevention of
[26] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
Tay-Sachs Disease
‘‘the best-known jewish genetic disorder’’
TSD, a rare inherited metabolic disorder, is associated with Jews of
Eastern European (Ashkenazic) ancestry. The gene occurs more frequently among Ashkenazic Jews than other populations, according
to decades-old studies. The incidence of TSD among Ashkenazic
Jews has fallen dramatically in recent decades as a result of mass carrier screening. Much of the data on TSD has yet to be updated as the
profile of the disease continues to change.
Carrier Frequency
Disease Incidence
Inheritance
Cause
Mechanism
Symptoms
1 in 25–30 Ashkenazic Jews
1 in 29 French Canadians and Louisiana
Cajuns
1 in 200–300 general population
(including Sephardic Jews)
1 in 2,500–3,000 Ashkenazic Jews
(natural incidence)*
Autosomal recessive
Gene mutation on chromosome 15
Hex-A deficiency (also known as betahexosaminidase A deficiency). The
deficiency prevents the body from
breaking down naturally occurring fatty
substances (GM2 gangliosides). These
substances become toxic as they
accumulate in the brain and nervous
tissue and will progressively destroy the
neurological system.
TSD is characterized by the onset of severe
mental and developmental retardation
during the first four to eight months of
life. The child also develops seizures that
are not controllable by drug therapy. After
the second to third year the child is totally
debilitated. Death typically results from
pneumonia or another infection in the
Treatments
Screening
Prevention
third to fifth year. (A late-onset form of
TSD occurs in adults, but very rarely.)
No effective treatment at this time
Carrier testing for adults can measure for
Hex-A deficiency in the blood or use a
genetic test to identify the TSD gene.
Prenatal testing is possible using
amniocentesis or chorionic villi sampling
to identify whether a fetus has the Hex-A
deficiency or the gene.
Tay-Sachs screening programs, including
the Dor Yeshorim, have detected tens of
thousands of carriers in the last few
decades, and many carrier couples in the
United States have been counseled about
their 25 percent chance of having a TSD
baby.
* By most accounts, TSD among Ashkenazic Jews has fallen
substantially from its ‘‘natural incidence.’’ In 2003 and 2004, only
ten TSD babies were born in the United States; none was Jewish.
Tay-Sachs disease possible, the question of a cure arises.’’ 33
Within years, however, it became clear that TSD was not the best
candidate for enzyme replacement therapy, and that there were
several better candidates among the lipid storage disorders for
this pioneering therapy.
Who might benefit from enzyme replacement therapy if not
the tragic Tay-Sachs patient? Chief among the better targets for
testing enzyme replacement therapy was the less well known lipid
storage disorder Gaucher’s disease, which came in several types.
Type I was as prevalent among Ashkenazic Jews as Tay-Sachs, but
its other forms were more widely distributed in the U.S. population.34 Gaucher’s (type I) was certainly not as symbolically power[28] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
Tay-Sachs and the Dor Yeshorim
The Dor Yeshorim model for conducting TSD carrier testing among
young Jewish people and encouraging them not to marry one another was created in New York City in the 1980s by Rabbi Josef Ekstein and then spread through other Orthodox Jewish communities.
Considered a success by geneticists and community people alike, the
practice generated controversy in the early 1990s when Ekstein decided to extend testing to several other, not invariably fatal, supposedly Jewish genetic diseases like cystic fibrosis and Gaucher’s disease.
‘‘I went knocking on the doors of community leaders, rabbis, anyone
who was ready to listen to me and some of those who weren’t, telling
them that this was a problem and we had to do something about it.
The point I made was that this was a problem for the entire community, not just for me . . . At the beginning of Dor Yeshorim, we had
much opposition . . . But the idea caught on . . . and it gained support
from other rabbis. Now testing has become part of Jewish culture.’’
—Rabbi Josef Ekstein, founder of the Dor Yeshorim, 2004
‘‘As you move further and further away from an untreatable disease
in which no one survives to cystic fibrosis and Gaucher’s disease (in
which the calculus of life, death and survival were starkly different),
I find the application much more troubling and much less acceptable.’’
—Mark Siegler, ethicist, 1993
‘‘When there is strong pressure within a community for members
to have genetic tests and to check on the genetic profiles of whomever they date . . . this is a miniature but significant version of Big
Brother . . . This is a moderate nightmare.’’
—Francis Collins, director of the National Human Genome
Research Institute, 1993
‘‘While ethicists agonize over some people’s being marginalized as
marriage partners, they would do better to focus on the fact that
medical conditions not manifesting themselves until middle age
[like Gaucher’s disease and cystic fibrosis] do not make them benign or pleasant to live with . . . Prevention beats remedy any day.’’
—Sura Jeselsohn, editorialist, 1993
‘‘Every single human being, you and me too, we have genetic risks for
our children, whether it’s cancer, early heart disease, or certain types
of mental illness. I don’t know where this stops, or who makes the
decision where it stops . . . When they start packaging other things
in there [with Tay-Sachs], I get real concerned.’’
—Michael Kaback, medical geneticist, 1994
ful for Jews as TSD; since its discovery in the 1880s, Gaucher’s had
never been associated with Jewish identity. Nor was it as dramatic
a disorder; it lacked the poignancy and personal tragedy of TSD.
Gaucher’s was first designated as a lipid storage disorder in the
1920s.35 But from the start, the Gaucher’s experience was different
from the TSD phenomenon. Some of the types involved neurological complaints, as in TSD. But type I, the one that later was deemed
more prevalent in Ashkenazic Jews, was a much milder disease, involving none of the neurological symptoms characteristic of TSD.
Moreover, the disorder’s onset during adulthood rather than infancy made it a dramatically different kind of family crisis. In comparison with TSD, discussion about either prevention or the possibility of enzyme replacement therapy for Gaucher’s reflected a
very different set of experiences, histories, and cultural politics.
Why did researchers single out Gaucher’s, not Tay-Sachs, as
a suitable candidate for testing the viability of enzyme therapy?
Roscoe Brady, a leading researcher in the field, noted in 1975, ‘‘We
are entering a new phase in the treatment of genetic diseases—
therapy by replacement of the deficient enzyme.’’ This mode of
therapy, he speculated, ‘‘appears to offer much promise . . . for
patients with Fabry’s disease and Gaucher’s disease. However, en[30] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
zyme replacement in patients with Tay-Sachs disease . . . where the
central nervous system is affected will require first the development of effective methods for the delivery of exogenous enzymes
to the brain.’’ 36 Researchers recognized that the neurological aspect of TSD—the involvement of the brain and the difficulties
of getting drugs across the physiological blood-brain barrier—
posed an almost unsurmountable obstacle to enzyme replacement
therapy. By the late 1970s and early 1980s, however, clinical trials
even on ‘‘best candidate’’ diseases like Gaucher’s had produced
ambiguous findings about the value of such agents.37 Indeed, in
1977 Robert Desnick and James Goldberg would write that ‘‘unfortunately, the prospects for the treatment of Tay-Sachs disease
are extremely discouraging.’’ 38 In 1982 two noted researchers pronounced that ‘‘overall, the results of enzyme replacement therapy must be judged a failure’’ because of many factors: the failure to purify enzyme, the difficulty of delivering enzymes to the
macrophage-monocyte system, the destruction of enzymes within
the cells, and the poor capacity of enzyme to contact intracellular
glycolipid deposits.39
The failure of enzyme replacement therapy in Gaucher’s disease, researchers reasoned, meant that the therapy’s prospects
in Tay-Sachs were even worse. Enzyme replacement in the brain
would have to involve passing macromolecules through the bloodbrain barrier, and this was frequently cited as an overwhelming
hurdle. Thus, even in this decade of rising expectations about enzyme replacement therapy, researchers uniformly affirmed that
‘‘because of the currently unsurmountable obstacles presented by
disorders with primary neural pathology, research efforts towards
enzyme therapy for lysosomal storage diseases have been directed
to selected disorders without neural involvement.’’ 40 Hopes for
this mode of therapy would be raised again in the 1990s when enzyme replacement resurfaced as a promising treatment for Gaucher’s disease. But in the 1970s and 1980s, when genetic screening
and the Dor Yeshorim first emerged, there was little optimism reEradicating a ‘‘Jewish Gene’’: Tay-Sachs Disease [31]
garding drug therapies for any of the lysosomal storage disorders.
Prevention of Tay-Sachs thus seemed to be the best strategy for
eradicating the disease, both for the present and quite likely for
decades to come.
The promise of enzyme replacement was not extinguished entirely, however, and in later years the stories of Tay-Sachs disease
and Gaucher’s would follow different paths—one toward prevention, the other toward treatment. While the diagnostic advances
and abortion policies of the 1970s had given rise to the prevention
movement, the very different technological and legislative climate
of the 1980s and 1990s pushed enzyme replacement back to center stage (at least for some diseases).41 The passage of the national
Orphan Disease Act of 1983 created powerful financial incentives
for pharmaceutical companies to develop therapies for rare disorders (such as Gaucher’s disease), research that would otherwise
be financially unrewarding. In the wake of these legislative incentives, and amid the explosive growth of the biotechnology industry, enzyme replacement would make another appearance when
the company Genzyme produced a new drug for Gaucher’s. By the
late 1990s, enzyme replacement was being hailed again as one of
the important therapeutic promises of the era, standing alongside
bone marrow transplantation for sickle cell disease and gene therapy for cystic fibrosis.42 To be sure, the high cost of enzyme replacement and the pricing policies of Genzyme drew criticism.43
But by the mid-1990s, enzyme replacement therapy for type I Gaucher’s disease had gone from hoped-for remedy to dismal failure
and back to clinical and market success. Hopes for those with lipid
storage disorders again seemed warranted, and pharmaceutical
companies nurtured these hopes in pursuit of profits. The promise did not extend to Tay-Sachs disease, however, for which few
researchers or drug companies promised any therapeutic breakthroughs. While Gaucher’s followed the new path of enzyme replacement, Tay-Sachs continued traveling the road of prevention.
[32] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
prevention and the promise of
jewish self-determination
The Dor Yeshorim emerged in the 1980s from scientific advances in diagnosis, and from a new politics of reproductive
control. But its most important influence was the particular meaning of Tay-Sachs disease for American Jewish survival and selfdetermination. In the late 1960s the linkage between prevention
and self-determination was highly politicized. There was, for example, intense public interest in the use of genetic counseling to
prevent the birth of children with hereditary diseases, enabling
parents to chart their own reproductive path and create healthy
families.44 The rise of amniocentesis, genetic screening, and reproductive counseling, coinciding with increased access to abortion, constituted a new approach to the prevention of hereditary
disease. Politicians too saw this linkage as genetic counseling became a focus of national hearings and legislation throughout the
1970s, drawing public attention to the fight against a host of genetic diseases.45 Prenatal screening and tests for a wide range
of diseases promised to identify ‘‘otherwise healthy persons who
possess genes that could be harmful to their offspring under
certain conditions, and who could benefit from genetic counseling.’’ 46 Autosomal recessive diseases like sickle cell disease, cystic fibrosis, and Tay-Sachs, in which the mechanisms and probabilities of inheritance were well established, attracted significant
attention as candidates for eradication by means of the avoidance
of birth.47 Such discussions were, naturally, controversial; family
or reproductive guidance offered by government officials in the
name of public health threatened to impinge directly on considerations of religion, individual rights, self-determination, and the
management of risks in diverse communities across the nation.
The very notion of managing a disease by controlling reproduction was fraught with risk for researchers and physicians, especially when their efforts seemed to target minority or disadvanEradicating a ‘‘Jewish Gene’’: Tay-Sachs Disease [33]
taged populations. Genetic counseling for sickle cell disease, for
example, had been highly controversial since its advent in 1972
and 1973, when it appeared to many African Americans that mandatory screening programs initiated by state governments were
merely efforts to impose limits on the size of black families. For
this community, genetic counseling quickly became associated
not with empowerment but with efforts to limit the black population and with insinuations about black genetic inferiority. Issues
like these were critical not only to black Americans but also to Jewish Americans, for whom the themes of population control, genetic inferiority, genocide, and community survival also had deep
historical and religious resonance.
For Tay-Sachs and sickle cell disease, the prevention idea was
tangled together with different questions of ethnic identity and
minority survival in a majority White Anglo-Saxon Protestant
America. To be sure, Tay-Sachs was a more uniformly fatal disorder than sickle cell disease, and for this and other reasons TSD
took on tragic meaning for those concerned about the preservation of a strong and cohesive Jewish people. Much more than the
suffering of children or the pain of parents was at stake here.
Moreover, this concern was articulated by Jewish leaders themselves—not, as with screening for sickle cell disease, by politicians
or government officials. It was rabbis and other religious leaders
who brought up the issue of self-preservation and put themselves
at the very center of the debate over how best to manage Tay-Sachs.
Because issues of cultural identity and survival were involved,
researchers explored the possibilities of ‘‘preventive therapy’’ for
Tay-Sachs disease with great caution and in partnership with community leaders. In doing so they showed that they had learned
much from mistakes of the early 1970s regarding proposals for
preventing sickle cell disease. The limitation of reproduction was
a complex and controversial issue. Depending on how this goal
was articulated, and who articulated it, the eradication of a gene
could be seen as an act of self-preservation or an attempt at population control by unsavory outsiders. At least one author argued
[34] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
that ‘‘the Jewish community in America can be readily organized
and educated through its various institutions to participate [in
Tay-Sachs screening]’’—implying that American Jews were culturally more accepting of professional or expert control than other
ethnic groups.48 At the same time, there was a strong aversion
among some religious leaders to intermarriage—another effective
method, of course, of preventing genetic disease. As one rabbi
stated bluntly, ‘‘For a people which constitutes less than 3 per
cent of the American population to countenance [high rates of
intermarriage] is to jeopardize Jewish survival in the extreme.’’ 49
Clearly any preventive therapy needed to address these social realities and political questions within affected communities. Who
would control the flow of information about carriers? Who would
weigh the possibilities of cure against the benefits of prevention?
Who was in a position to evaluate the promise of research? Toward
what ultimate end and for whose benefit would new information
be used? And as this information was put to use, what would be
the cost to individual self-determination? Each community would
tackle these questions in its own way.
The particular features of the diseases in question added further complexity. Tay-Sachs, sickle cell, Gaucher’s, and the others
each had its own character, variability, burdens, and meanings.
Despite the similarities in how ‘‘ethnic hereditary diseases’’ were
passed from parents to offspring, there were crucial differences
between the stories of Tay-Sachs and sickle cell disease, for example, as presented in popular, scientific, and political discussions. But most important, a huge gap in life expectancy and life
chances confronted children born with these two disorders. TaySachs disease presented the tragic scenario of a tiny child ‘‘cheated
of the opportunity to live out his life,’’ silently suffering a tragedy
that could have been avoided if only the parents had received
enough information through genetic screening and prenatal diagnosis to prevent its birth.50 The child had no independent identity in public imagery apart from its suffering parents. There were
no popular profiles of people living with TSD as there were for
Eradicating a ‘‘Jewish Gene’’: Tay-Sachs Disease [35]
sickle cell disease or cystic fibrosis. There were no dramatic portraits to match the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation’s poster child and
no popular books comparable to Frank Deford’s 1983 book Alex.51
The birth of a TSD baby was characterized as a tragic pathology
in itself. Avoidance of birth was the only hope. As one physician
said of TSD testing, ‘‘This test eliminates the possibility of pain
. . . you’re saving a little life of interminable suffering. The whole
idea is to avoid that. Tay-Sachs, that’s unrelenting pain and that
never goes away.’’ 52
Against this backdrop, the advent of new Tay-Sachs testing
technology and birth prevention transformed the emotional possibilities for parents and reshaped the ethical and legal landscape
as well. Prenatal testing was often assumed to be infallible. Indeed, some parents would pin their hopes on testing and prevention to such an extent that in cases where testing gave incorrect information and TSD babies were born, debate arose about
whether lab scientists and physicians could be held accountable
on the grounds of allowing a ‘‘wrongful life.’’ Whereas an earlier
generation might have seen the birth of a TSD baby as fated, a new
cohort of parents might see such a birth as entirely preventable
and characterize errors in testing as ‘‘preventive malpractice.’’ 53
These disease prevention efforts took on particular meanings
for American Jews in the context of simmering anxiety about Jewish intermarriage and group survival in the 1970s and 1980s. The
post–World War II years had seen a mainstreaming of American
Jews into the larger culture. As historian Matthew Frye Jacobsen
has noted, whereas in ‘‘the latter half of the nineteenth century
Jews, by common consensus, did represent a distinct race . . .
by the mid-twentieth such certainties had evaporated.’’American
Jews ‘‘became white folks,’’ in popular thinking, by moving to
the suburbs, losing accents, and integrating into middle-class life
and culture. But in the 1970s and 1980s attention shifted back to
themes of Jewish ethnic distinctiveness, group survival, and continuing coherence. The preservation of Jewish culture in families
became, according to one scholar, ‘‘perhaps the most striking fea[36] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
ture of the Jewish family . . . each person filled with a sense of duty
and responsibility toward the other.’’ 54
The theme of a people at risk resonated powerfully with the
ideal of prevention that emerged in the 1970s. For many, screening, counseling, and selective abortion came to take on farreaching ‘‘therapeutic’’ connotations.55 Between 1971 and 1975,
more than one hundred thousand Jewish people in America were
screened for Tay-Sachs disease, producing information on carrier
frequency in this population (later revealed to be 1 in 27.3 persons).56 Screening was also encouraged by national initiatives like
the National Sickle Cell Anemia, Cooley’s Anemia, Tay-Sachs, and
Genetic Diseases Act of 1976, which provided dollars for research,
training, testing, counseling, and education for a wide range of
genetic disorders.57
Even as screening programs detected more carriers and prevented diseases, controversy shadowed these efforts.58 One of the
pitfalls to genetic testing lay in how it was promoted. One physician, for example, objected to the promise of the Tay-Sachs prevention program that ‘‘detection and counseling [would] enable
carrier couples to have children free of this disease.’’ While on
the surface the claim rang true, it was also misleading, he argued,
because the ambiguous phrase ‘‘have children free of this disease’’ might be read by some people as a suggestion that ‘‘some
therapeutic maneuver would somehow make the genetically defective child normal.’’ Being tested and having offspring ‘‘free of
the disease,’’ he argued, needed to be more clearly defined as involving ‘‘amnioscentesic tests and then abortion.’’ 59 The concern
also arose that screening programs might stigmatize carriers of
hereditary disease: ‘‘Modern [diagnostic] technology may have
introduced a new biological and social label—‘carrier’—with yet
unknown psychological and social consequences.’’ How would
families, communities, neighbors, employers, or insurers respond
to the carriers of genetic disease? As two authors writing on the
question of stigma noted, ‘‘We do not know what part an individual’s religious affiliation or degree of commitment plays in his
Eradicating a ‘‘Jewish Gene’’: Tay-Sachs Disease [37]
ability to accept his carrier status without denigrating his human
worth.’’ 60
The pitfalls of testing and identifying carriers were numerous.
The danger had become strikingly evident in the late 1960s when
Linus Pauling suggested that a distinctive mark should be tattooed
on the foreheads of children carrying the sickle cell trait so that
they could recognize one another as carriers from an early age
and avoid falling in love, marrying, and producing children.61 Increasingly as well, the ethical pitfalls became more evident when
screening programs began to preach about the economic benefits of testing and the social costs of genetic diseases. For some,
heavy-handed persuasion of carriers to avoid pregnancy seemed
warranted by the high financial costs to society, the ‘‘economic
burden of genetic disease [being] substantial.’’ 62 For others, however, such considerations went beyond the bounds of what a liberal society should encourage.
In this context, some authors wondered whether anxieties
about genetic disease were being overplayed and oversold to Ashkenazic Jewish populations. What did it mean, they wondered,
that the issue of Tay-Sachs disease in Jews had become suffused
with religious and communal significance? Madeleine and Lenn
Goodman noted with some consternation, ‘‘Brochures warning
American Jews against genetic diseases are printed in blue on
white, the colors of the Jewish prayer shawl and of the flag of
Israel. One logo showed the profile of a child’s face from which
fell a single tear, inset into a Star of David.’’ 63 The tear, they explained, referred to one method of TSD detection (teardrops were
the fluid often tested).64 But the emotional valence was obvious:
this was a disease about which many tears had been shed in Jewish communities. Other scholars pointed out that the new trend
toward genetic and reproductive counseling posed ‘‘special challenges’’ to Jewish people ‘‘because of the complexities of Jewish
religious law’’ on matters of disease prevention and abortion, and
‘‘because of the collective memory of Nazi attempts at genetic
control during the Holocaust.’’ 65 Such commentaries acknowl[38] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
edged that discussions about Tay-Sachs would necessarily merge
uneasily into larger discussions about Jewish genetic status, ‘‘Jewish genetic diseases,’’ and the Jewish past, present, and future.
Thus, even as testing initiatives progressed from the 1970s into
the 1990s, some physicians and ethicists raised questions about
the detrimental effects of genetic screening, drawing attention
to the perpetuation of noxious stereotypes about Jewish inbreeding and disease, the diversion of community resources that might
be used in other ways, and the use of testing programs to increase the power of rabbis, religious officials, and community
leaders. For other observers this was not a problem at all. Indeed,
it seemed altogether good that such officials were involved. But
according to Madeleine and Lenn Goodman, ‘‘Enlisting the aid of
such leaders places them in the problematic position of advocating a preconceived ethical position to their constituents in the very
circumstances in which the constituents might be turning to the
rabbi as a source of independent guidance regarding ethically difficult choices.’’ 66 Could it be that rabbis and other leaders were assuming inappropriate roles—taking on a fiduciary character with
regard to their constituents? 67
However controversial it was, the community-based battle
against Tay-Sachs disease came to be regarded as an unqualified
success. Jewish Americans’ use of prevention as the best therapy
was celebrated in the 1980s as an example of enlightened selfdetermination using new genetic information. The story seemed
to represent one of the best examples of the meshing of genetic information with local values and the championing of self-determination by communities, individuals, couples, and religious leaders
concerned with questions of morality and group preservation. For
Tay-Sachs, the new age of genetic information meant that prenatal testing and abortion could prevent disease. The impact was
far reaching. The example of Tay-Sachs prevention spawned new
research questions about how and why different at-risk communities responded as they did to genetic risk and to this notion of
disease prevention. It also established new expectations among
Eradicating a ‘‘Jewish Gene’’: Tay-Sachs Disease [39]
would-be parents about genetic counseling and the birth process.
Some observers began to ask whether physicians and counselors
were keeping up with the fast flow of new information about TaySachs disease and its at-risk populations.68 Others began to ask
whether after almost a decade of practice the TSD screening programs had accomplished their goals and at what cost to communities and families.69 And despite the success of the prevention
program, still others continued to ask if enzyme replacement therapy for TSD was ever going to materialize.70
The successful model of prevention via prenatal testing and
abortion had definite limits as a cultural practice. For those with
theological or political proscriptions against abortion, this mode
of prevention was never an option. Orthodox Jews opposed abortion, and for some within this constituency the Dor Yeshorim
represented an alternative path toward prevention and community health—a way to put the new genetic information to use without resort to abortion. For them, all that was needed were subtle
adjustments to the rituals associated with adolescence. Indeed,
as the Dor Yeshorim took shape and spread, it too showed that
genetic testing could be integrated with specific moral and religious concerns. Identifying carriers, eradicating disease, and solving the Tay-Sachs problem need not include abortion, and could
indeed support and strengthen the institution of arranged marriages among Orthodox Jews. This, to be sure, was a desirable
‘‘therapeutic’’ solution.71
Yet the community-based prevention of Tay-Sachs disease remained a positive model, particularly in an age of rapidly proliferating genetic information. Indeed, it was at this very time
that ‘‘community consent’’ began to appear as a topic of interest
in the medical ethics literature.72 The story of TSD had several appealing features as a model. It involved a minority population as
well as a minority within the minority group, both concerned with
self-preservation and ethnic values. It also involved groups that
were reputed to respect scientific information and that actively incorporated into innovative programs new information about their
[40] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
identity and risks of disease. In March 2003, noting that the TaySachs unit in New York’s Kingsbrook Jewish Medical Center now
stood ‘‘completely empty,’’ one professor of neurology asserted
that it was ‘‘foolish, even criminal, for observant Jews not to undergo testing to prevent the birth of children with these dreaded
diseases.’’ 73
Not all groups, however, waged similarly successful battles
against Tay-Sachs disease in the 1980s and 1990s. French Canadians and Louisiana Cajuns, groups having very different identity politics, saw rates of TSD rise.74 As in the case of American
Jews, news accounts focused on issues such as inbreeding, group
preservation, and the need to spread information about genetic
status. The increasing incidence of Tay-Sachs in these non-Jewish
populations would be seen as cautionary tales, however, and they
only confirmed the exemplary nature of the TSD story in Jewish
communities. However, when the architects of the Dor Yeshorim
sought to expand the success of its ‘‘genetic matchmaking’’ service in the 1990s, the story line of success changed abruptly and a
revealing clash emerged.
from dream to nightmare? the dor yeshorim
The religious and moral concerns that gave rise to the Dor Yeshorim were evident as early as a 1977 conference on Tay-Sachs
disease, when tensions arose between Conservative and Orthodox rabbis. Each group worried about traditional Jewish law and
its relation to the new issues of therapeutic abortion, to genetic
counseling, and to the meaning of the life and death of the child
with TSD. Noted one Conservative rabbi, ‘‘We recognize the trying ordeal which would be suffered by parents of a Tay-Sachsdiseased child . . . and therefore my own view is that the termination of pregnancy [via abortion] is morally defensible and
halachically [i.e., in terms of Jewish law] acceptable.’’ But for Josef
Ekstein, the Ultra-Orthodox rabbi who had created the Dor Yeshorim, the problem was that prenatal screening had created a
Eradicating a ‘‘Jewish Gene’’: Tay-Sachs Disease [41]
new set of problems. ‘‘A test was developed in the 1970s,’’ Ekstein
later noted, ‘‘but it was not used by the orthodox Jewish community because abortion is forbidden, so prenatal screening was out
of the question.’’ 75 For this rabbi, religious law could not sanction
abortion as a means of avoiding the ordeal of Tay-Sachs even if it
was understood as an intense form of familial suffering.
As agents of families in their communities, rabbis played a
critical role in defining the moral and religious basis for this
‘‘therapeutics of prevention’’ into the 1980s and 1990s.76 The distinct Jewish religious communities—Ultra-Orthodox, Orthodox,
Reform, and Conservative—brought their diverse perspectives to
the questions of family, community, and survival and to defining
a meaningful approach to Tay-Sachs disease. In Orthodox and socalled Ultra-Orthodox communities, the Dor Yeshorim emerged
as the sanctioned way toward TSD prevention.77 Ekstein’s original plan had been to carry out general premarital testing, but
when other leading rabbis expressed concern about stigmatizing
young people as carriers, a more circumscribed anonymous testing model emerged. Over the years, in practice this has meant that
a representative of the Dor Yeshorim would distribute identification numbers to all individuals who one day might consider marriage. The individuals were then tested, either in religious schools
or other settings, and whenever inquiries about potential mates
would begin, the parties would exchange identification numbers
and submit them to the Dor Yeshorim. The organization would
quickly confirm whether the ID numbers indicated the genetic
compatibility of the proposed couple. Ekstein used his influence
to promote the practice while reshaping parental and community
views about the disease. ‘‘A disease that runs in the family was a
very taboo subject in our community,’’ he later wrote. ‘‘Families
who had children with diseases . . . didn’t talk about it for fear
that their healthy children would not be able to marry.’’ The Dor
Yeshorim changed this dynamic. ‘‘At first,’’ Ekstein noted, ‘‘they
didn’t like it. Parents of sick children were afraid of their dirty
laundry becoming public. The rest of the people did not know
[42] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
what I was talking about. But I knew that this disease was preventable, and the only way it could be prevented was if someone spoke
out . . . I went knocking on the doors of community leaders, rabbis, anyone who was ready to listen to me . . . The point I made
was that this was a problem for the entire community.’’ 78
The Dor Yeshorim, a kind of religiously sanctioned genetic
matchmaking service, emerged out of a long series of discussions
and fit neatly into Orthodox religious thinking about abortion, reproduction, religious hierarchy, and communal decision making.
Noted one rabbi in 1990, ‘‘It is the obligation of every parent, without exception, to turn to Dor Yeshorim and heed their advice, before finalizing a match for his or her child.’’ 79 Or as another authority noted more recently, people outside this tightly structured,
traditional world ‘‘generally want autonomy over their bodies,’’
but such notions carried less weight in Ultra-Orthodox culture.80
The goal of the program was clear: ‘‘to eliminate Tay-Sachs from
the Orthodox community, and to do it in accordance with strict
Jewish law.’’ For some Orthodox groups this meant eliminating
the disease both without birth control and without abortions. As
one author described the practice, ‘‘If a peek into a prospective
couple’s genetic code shows a bad match, they are discouraged
from even dating and certainly from marrying.’’ 81 The close ties
of Orthodox communities, and parents’ tight control over their
children, ensured that such constraints could in fact be applied.
The Dor Yeshorim had a profoundly personal significance for
Ekstein, who had witnessed the devastating effects of Tay-Sachs
disease in his own family. By 1983, when he started the practice,
his wife had given ‘‘birth to four Tay-Sachs children one after another, all of whom died before the age of six, even though the risk
of the disease in children born to two carriers is 25% for each pregnancy.’’ 82 Within a decade of the creation of the practice, Ekstein
could note proudly that ‘‘8,000 young people were tested each year
for the recessive genes.’’ The Dor Yeshorim rapidly spread to other
Orthodox communities in California, Tennessee, Michigan, Florida, and other states, becoming something of an ‘‘adolescent rite
Eradicating a ‘‘Jewish Gene’’: Tay-Sachs Disease [43]
of passage.’’ 83 As of 1993, sixty-seven New York couples who had
been considering marriage had decided against it because of the
risk.84
But controversy flared in that same year when the Dor Yeshorim
in New York sought to expand to include testing for diseases that
were not as severe as Tay-Sachs but that had become widely linked
to so-called Jewish genes. In many respects, this was an understandable effort to build on a successful program by using new developments suggesting a linkage between other diseases and Jews.
As one newspaper described the practice:
Every year, Dor Yeshorim representatives go to the private high
schools where many Orthodox families send their children and
explain to the teen-agers that they can have a simple blood test
to see if they carry genes for any of three diseases, Tay-Sachs,
cystic fibrosis and Gaucher’s disease. [Cystic fibrosis and Gaucher’s were the new diseases to be tested that had shown a
higher incidence among Jews.] Those tested are given a sixdigit identification number. If a boy and girl want to date, or if
they have already started dating, they are encouraged to call the
New York Dor Yeshorim Central Office Hotline with their identification numbers. Then they are told either that the match is
compatible—that they are not at risk of having children with
the diseases in question—or that they each carry a recessive
gene that could result in a child with one of the diseases.85
This expansion of the Dor Yeshorim program, though modest,
raised serious questions for those outside the boundaries of Orthodox Jewish communities.
Experts ranging from medical ethicists to the head of the National Human Genome Research Institute denounced the expansion of Dor Yeshorim testing, calling it ethically and morally troubling. It was one thing, they insisted, to prevent the birth of babies
with the deadly disease of Tay-Sachs, but quite another issue to
extend the practice of ‘‘genetic matchmaking’’ and birth prevention to manageable disorders like cystic fibrosis and Gaucher’s
[44] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
disease. Ethicist Mark Siegler put it this way: ‘‘As you move further and further away from an untreatable disease in which no
one survives to cystic fibrosis and Gaucher’s disease (in which
the calculus of life, death and survival were starkly different), I
find the application much more troubling and much less acceptable.’’ Francis Collins, director of the National Human Genome
Research Institute, allowed that some aspects of the Dor Yeshorim
programs ‘‘sound just fine.’’ Misgivings emerge, however, ‘‘when
there is strong pressure within a community for members to have
genetic tests and to check on the genetic profiles of whomever
they date.’’ Such experts feared the prospect of coercion. They
also objected to the idea of preventing the birth of babies who
had diseases for which there were (or promised to be) effective
treatments, or who carried genes for diseases that might be mild
or that might manifest themselves only much later in life. Where
would this practice lead, they protested? Collins noted conclusively, ‘‘This is a miniature but significant version of Big Brother
. . . This is a moderate nightmare.’’ 86
Control over these practices continued to rest, however, with
the community, not with outside experts, and a few days after the
publication of the newspaper story describing the expanded testing program, one observer shot back at the ethicists and geneticists: ‘‘While ethicists agonize over some people’s being marginalized as marriage partners, they would do better to focus on the fact
that medical conditions not manifesting themselves until middle
age [like Gaucher’s disease and cystic fibrosis] do not make them
benign or pleasant to live with . . . Prevention beats remedy any
day.’’ 87 Other screening programs in nearby New York medical
schools were also exploring the idea of introducing screening
for cystic fibrosis and Gaucher’s disease in conjunction with TaySachs carrier screening.88
Expert criticism of the Dor Yeshorim seemed, in the short term,
to have little impact on the practice of screening for more genes in
order to create healthy matches. The extension of the practice was
seen as a victory, a ‘‘pioneering scheme’’ in the eradication of disEradicating a ‘‘Jewish Gene’’: Tay-Sachs Disease [45]
eases. But the Dor Yeshorim in its new incarnation was no longer
an unambiguous exemplar, a model of genetic disease prevention.
The criticism, noted one commentator, had put Rabbi Ekstein ‘‘on
the defensive against geneticists worried by the programme’s extension to two other inherited diseases.’’ In cystic fibrosis, for example, the troubling reality was that the Dor Yeshorim was preventing the birth of people who could live into their fifties.89
What factors drove the expansion of the Dor Yeshorim? The
awareness that we all have genetic risks had been growing quickly
throughout the 1980s and 1990s as genetic studies churned out
more and more information about the links between genes and
diseases. In some respects it was this very flood of new information about disease genes and their prevalence in the population
that provoked the expansion of the Dor Yeshorim. As new information came along, the key question for doctors, patients, policy
makers, and society at large was whether to expand the genetic
testing services offered. Many rabbis had become closely tied to
the world of genetic scientists, and extensive screening in TaySachs had made a generation of Ashkenazic Jews more available
to medical genetics research—research on not only Tay-Sachs but
a range of other disorders—than at any time in the past. The result of this cooperation had been an explosion of knowledge and
theories about a range of so-called Jewish genetic diseases.90
By the mid-1990s, scientists were openly speculating about the
links between cancer, genes, and Jewish identity, thus raising
the stakes for the Dor Yeshorim.91 The new information raised
the question of when testing should be done and when it should
be curtailed. Rabbi Ekstein himself, the founder of the Dor Yeshorim, noted that he ‘‘would never test for genetic diseases that
have dominant genes (which increase the risk of cancer, for example).’’ Amid the reports of two genes (BRCA1 and BRCA2) linked
to a high risk for breast cancer in Jewish women, Ekstein commented that these genes were very different from genes for TaySachs: ‘‘Knowing [that one carried the BRCA1 gene and could pass
it on to one’s children] could cause a patient much harm when
[46] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
making life decisions.’’ Not only were the inheritance patterns of
these genes not as straightforward as in TSD, but also such testing
fit less neatly into the moral world of Orthodox Judaism: ‘‘Knowing they carry defective genes can cause low self-image, so we are
determined not to test for defective dominant genes.’’ In addition,
the BRCA1 gene did not carry the same inevitable consequences of
death associated with Tay-Sachs. Ekstein noted that for women
with BRCA1, cancer ‘‘was not inevitable, unlike children born with
two harmful recessive genes.’’ 92 Ekstein’s conclusion was clear:
there would be no testing in the Dor Yeshorim for breast cancer
genes regardless of their prevalence among Jewish women.
The discoveries of such disease-causing genes during the
1990s, however, created an increasing pressure to test. Studies
proliferated, purporting to have found the gene for one thing
or another: homosexuality, obesity, breast cancer, deafness, and
many, many more. Americans began wondering which of these
assertions were speculative, which were merely suggestive, and
which were real causes for concern. In November 1998, for example, a New York Times headlines blared, ‘‘Gene Identified as
Major Cause of Deafness in Ashkenazi Jews.’’ As if to clarify
the ambiguity of the headline, the text noted that the discovery
did not mean that there was more deafness among Jews than
in other groups. It meant only that scientists believed they had
found ‘‘a particular genetic mutation that is more common among
deaf Jewish people than among deaf people from other backgrounds.’’ 93 Despite the many caveats attached to these findings,
shortly afterward the Dor Yeshorim in New York began receiving
requests for testing from families in which deafness had occurred,
which compelled Ekstein to state that he was not sure that this
service would be provided.
The logic of the marketplace and the possibility of profiting
from diagnostic testing also exerted pressure on programs like the
Dor Yeshorim. By the 1990s, nearly ten years after its creation, the
Dor Yeshorim was no longer merely a benevolent nonprofit institution but a large money-making venture. With the cost of a test
Eradicating a ‘‘Jewish Gene’’: Tay-Sachs Disease [47]
hovering around $250, one Ultra-Orthodox rabbi argued that genetic testing had become ‘‘a multi-million dollar industry’’ that
was aggravating anxieties about inherited diseases and stirring
up irrational fears about ‘‘so-called bad genes among people with
little knowledge of human genetics, and that includes rabbis.’’ 94
As one team of New York researchers noted, ‘‘New tests can be
readily incorporated into established heterozygote screening programs.’’ Moreover, the successes in screening for Tay-Sachs disease had created an atmosphere favorable toward testing: ‘‘The
Ashkenazi Jewish population . . . tends to choose testing for all
conditions for which heterozygote screening is available.’’ 95 By
2005, according to one estimate, eighteen thousand people were
tested annually by the Dor Yeshorim.96
This pattern of expansively testing Jewish bodies created its
own new dilemmas. By the 1980s and 1990s the Ashkenazic Jewish population had come to provide a large body of data for use in
a growing number of genetic tests and studies. Tay-Sachs screening programs brought thousands into clinics, where their blood
samples could be tested not only for that disease but also, increasingly, for other genetic abnormalities. New information about genetic diseases in this study population emerged, and with it came
the unfortunate tendency to suggest that these new problems were
also ‘‘Jewish diseases’’ without having done studies in other populations. Publicity about such studies suggested, in turn, a uniquely
tainted population, even though their authors struggled to make
clear that their findings did not mean, for example, that deafness
was especially prevalent among Jews or that it was any more due
to genetics in Jews than in other groups. The research merely indicated that a gene had been found in this group; and the possibility existed that the same gene or similar ones would be found
in other groups. Studies sometimes pointed out that because this
group had made itself available for testing, it merely happened to
be the group discussed. But such details were often buried far beneath the headlines; such distinctions were often blurred in media
reports on ‘‘Jewish genes’’ and ‘‘Jewish diseases.’’ By the 1990s,
[48] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
then, it had become quite clear to Rabbi Ekstein and others that
there were both new promises and new dangers in becoming a target population for screening in an age of ever-expanding genetic
information and services.
Not surprisingly, tensions emerged within the community over
the implications of the increasing scientific and public focus on
Jewish diseases.97 Even as some urged the widening of disease
testing, rabbis like Moshe Tendler worried that the focus on Jewish genetic diseases threatened the repetition of an awful past. In
November 1999, as reports of other Jewish genetic mutations and
disease appeared in the news and as the Dor Yeshorim was reconsidering whether to expand its services, Tendler worried ‘‘about
possible discrimination from employers who might hesitate to
hire someone prone to a genetic disease.’’ At the time, amid national outrage over the practice of health insurance companies
‘‘cherry-picking’’ healthy policyholders and denying coverage to
people at high risk for disease, concerns about genetic discrimination reflected anxieties about both ethnic discrimination and
discrimination based on health status. Such talk about Jewish diseases sent a message that actually threatened Jews and that ‘‘could
encourage anti-Semites who believe, as Adolf Hitler did, that Jews
have ‘bad genes.’ ’’ 98
By 2000, acknowledging a wide array of concerns, the Dor
Yeshorim had removed Gaucher’s disease from its list of targeted
diseases. Although parents were given an option to test for Gaucher’s, mandated tests now included only Tay-Sachs, Canavan’s
disease, cystic fibrosis, and Fanconi’s anemia.99 The decision is
revealing, for it highlights the facts that Gaucher’s disease had
acquired a very different meaning by 2000, that there was significant disagreement about the wisdom of preventing some diseases,
and that the biotechnology and pharmaceutical industries’ great
hopes for treatment were inconsistent with the ideology of prevention.
What constitutes success in the management of heredity and
disease? Who determines what is and is not a success? Such quesEradicating a ‘‘Jewish Gene’’: Tay-Sachs Disease [49]
tions highlight that, in a diverse and liberal society, the dream
of disease control will often be contested. The rise of the genetic
matchmakers must be seen as one part of the continuing search
for minority group self-determination through enlightened selfmanagement. But by the 1990s the story of Tay-Sachs disease had
unearthed deep-seated concerns about how and whether this prevention model should be extended. Some observers speculated
that if the prevention approach worked for TSD, it should also
be tried in Gaucher’s, cystic fibrosis, and other genetic disorders.
Yet the social logic of prevention was not the same in all diseases
or in all groups. The success or failure of the new genetic medicine—whether genetic testing, gene therapy, or tailored drugs
(pharmacogenomics)—can never be separated from practices of
self-management and disease prevention in families and communities. Indeed, the effort in the 1980s and 1990s to expand the
TSD prevention model to a wider spectrum of lipid storage disorders made clear the enormous differences among so-called genetic diseases, the multiplicity of views about eradicating such
diseases, and even the variations within each disease and community. What once appeared to be a model example of how a
small ethnic/religious community could be organized to eradicate
a deadly disease evolved in 1993 into a complex, controversial case
highlighting the pitfalls of social engineering.
prevention versus cure:
conflicting genetic worldviews
The controversy over testing for Gaucher’s disease reflected a
clash of values, a tension between two cultural perspectives, both
rooted in powerful and arguably successful ideologies. One ideology focused on ethnic group preservation by means of prevention, the other on imminent cures and the role of the marketplace
in bringing them about. Tay-Sachs was closely associated with the
former ideology, Gaucher’s with the latter.
Gaucher’s disease and Tay-Sachs provide a striking example of
[50] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
how two genetic maladies can border one another and yet take on
profoundly different cultural meanings and travel different historical paths. With Gaucher’s, these meanings were shaped not
so much by the politics of ethnic self-preservation, or even by
its association with a particular ethnic group, as by other political and economic forces. Despite Rabbi Ekstein’s view that it was
one of the many genetic diseases threatening the Jewish population, Gaucher’s disease had followed a very different historical
trajectory from Tay-Sachs and by the 1990s had become closely associated with the a burgeoning biotechnology enterprise and its
promises of impending breakthroughs.100 Moreover, Gaucher’s
did not call to mind the powerful image of inevitable decline that
haunted would-be parents and shaped public and medical discussions about Tay-Sachs. The ideals of community-based prevention
that had worked so well with Tay-Sachs could not be easily applied
to the eradication of Gaucher’s, nor could screening ‘‘successes’’
be easily translated from the one disease to the other.101 Indeed,
the pharmaceutical management of Gaucher’s offered a contrasting model of success, one that embraced but also transcended the
disease’s categorization as a ‘‘Jewish’’ malady.
Although Tay-Sachs disease and Gaucher’s are considered to
be in the same family of lysosomal disorders, the differences between them are extensive. Perhaps the most striking difference is
that Gaucher’s, discovered in 1882, comprises such a diverse range
of clinical phenomena. The disorder causes erosion of bone tissue
and fractures and can be characterized by episodic bruising and
bleeding.102 But in many people with Gaucher’s, these symptoms
may never rise to the level of a complaint. The symptoms range
from nonexistent to mild to severe, and onset can come at any
time—in infancy, adolescence, the middle years, or old age. Another difference, perhaps a crucial one from the standpoint of testing, emerged only after the 1980s: among those with the gene for
Gaucher’s disease, only 30 percent will ever manifest the disease.
By the 1990s it was known that seven out of every ten people with
the gene for Gaucher’s disease would never show signs of illness
Eradicating a ‘‘Jewish Gene’’: Tay-Sachs Disease [51]
or experience anything other than normal longevity and health.
The screening of parents or fetuses for Gaucher’s thus raised profound questions about just what was being prevented and what
risks were being managed—especially since the disease was in no
sense inevitable for those carrying the gene.
Issues of Jewish identity had never been historically central to
Gaucher’s disease as they had for Tay-Sachs. Its public profile in
the 1990s was not as a Jewish genetic disease but as an ‘‘orphan
disease’’: a disorder whose rarity made it—in stark contrast, for
example, to cancer or heart disease—an unlikely target for pharmaceutical research, the numbers of patients being too small and
the potential for profit too slim to make research financially attractive. Passage of the national Orphan Disease Act of 1983 had
drawn attention to such diseases, giving drug companies a range
of financial incentives to conduct research on these maladies and
to develop drugs for them.103 This legislation—enacted in the
Reagan-era climate of deregulation, supply-side economics, and
federal incentives for economic innovation—raised the political
and economic profile of Gaucher’s disease. Companies such as
the Boston-based Genzyme came to recognize the potential for
profit in genetic treatments for Gaucher’s and other such diseases.
By the end of the 1990s, enzyme replacement for Gaucher’s had
become a profitable enterprise and an option, albeit an expensive one, for many patients.104 This scientific, therapeutic, and
marketplace success stood in marked contrast to the story of TaySachs disease and helped push the older model of preventive management toward the margins of the fight against genetic disease.
Was the Dor Yeshorim’s program of Tay-Sachs screening and
prevention a model for other diseases? Or were new trends in
therapeutic innovation and pharmaceutical investment pushing
prevention to the margins? In 1993, those who opposed the inclusion of Gaucher’s in the Dor Yeshorim program, medical geneticist Michael Kaback among them, believed that disease testing had been oversold to the public. Scientists had oversimplified
the benefits of genetic screening with the message that ‘‘if a test
[52] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
exists, you should use it.’’ This mentality obscured the manifest
differences between various genetic disorders. When TSD strikes,
Kaback noted, it is always fatal and demoralizing for all concerned. By contrast, only a ‘‘minority of people [with Gaucher’s]
have severe and painful symptoms appearing in childhood . . .
The first symptom usually does not surface until about age 45
[and] many people never know they have the disease.’’ Accordingly, Kaback cautioned against extending the Dor Yeshorim’s genetic screening efforts from Tay-Sachs to Gaucher’s. Tay-Sachs, he
argued, was the exception among genetic diseases, not the rule,
and so ‘‘when they start packaging other things in there [with TaySachs], I get real concerned.’’ 105
By the late 1980s it also seemed clear that an effective enzyme
replacement therapy for Gaucher’s was on the way, and on 5 April
1991 the FDA approved macrophage-targeted glucocerebrosidase
as a specific treatment for the disease.106 The financial incentives
built in to the Orphan Disease Act also now came into play, turning Gaucher’s into a more attractive subject of research for drug
companies. Genzyme, a leading player in the growing biotechnology industry, used the enzyme replacement research of Roscoe
Brady at the National Institutes of Health to move into the business of Gaucher’s disease management.107 By 2000 Genzyme was
the second-largest biotechnology company in New England, with
75 percent of its 1999 revenue coming from its Gaucher’s drugs
Cerezyme and Ceredase (Cerezyme’s predecessor).108
While the expense of enzyme replacement was prohibitive for
many patients, estimated at $100,000 per year in 1993, Kaback and
others suggested that avoiding that high cost was not a sufficient
reason for parents to abort or prevent a Gaucher’s baby. Avoiding
the pain of infant death from Tay-Sachs was one thing; avoiding
the high cost of care for Gaucher’s was quite another. Even Ekstein agreed. In 1993, when the Dor Yeshorim extended couples
testing to include Gaucher’s, he observed that ‘‘with Tay-Sachs,
there may be ethical reasons to abort . . . But there is no ethical reason to abort a Gaucher’s baby.’’ 109 While the remark would seem
Eradicating a ‘‘Jewish Gene’’: Tay-Sachs Disease [53]
to reopen the door to abortion for Orthodox Jews seeking to avoid
TSD, it also reveals Ekstein’s awareness that the growing ability
to treat Gaucher’s made the extension of Dor Yeshorim screening a matter of controversy in the American Jewish community.
This was not merely an ethical conundrum but a dilemma born of
the different historical trajectories of the two diseases. The way
in which Gaucher’s had been pushed into the public spotlight as
an orphan disease had given it a powerful cultural label that distinguished it quite clearly from Tay-Sachs, which had evolved in
public thinking as a tragic inheritance among Ashkenazic Jews.
Many observers in American Jewish communities—as well as
in Israel, where Gaucher’s disease was likewise a prominent concern and where its treatment was covered under the national
health plan—saw compelling parallels between Tay-Sachs disease
and Gaucher’s. After all, the prevalence of type I Gaucher’s was
higher among Ashkenazic Jews than among any other population.
Who, then, was to say whether the disease was a ‘‘Jewish disease’’
or not? Who was to say what level of disease and distress should
be singled out for prevention? And in the wake of therapeutic success, what kinds of commitments should be made to get expensive treatments into the hands of patients? 110 While almost no one
quibbled over the wisdom of preventing TSD births, prevention
of Gaucher’s raised hackles in some quarters. For most observers,
Gaucher’s did not speak to questions of Jewish survival, selfpreservation, and identity but rather highlighted a different set
of cultural questions: How could government incentives, pharmaceutical innovation, and a fair marketplace for drugs help people
confront this rare, variable, but treatable disease? Who would pay
for the expensive drugs? And how would society at large respond
to the needs and burdens represented by individuals with the disease?
To place Gaucher’s in the context of the American political
economy is to understand how constituencies very different from
those in the TSD story shaped the lives of individuals affected
by the disease. An array of historical forces came to bear on the
[54] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
question of whether prevention constituted success. In the case
of Gaucher’s disease, the growing national commitment to biotechnology changed the very meaning of success and failure. Biotechnology breakthroughs convinced some observers that Gaucher’s
and cystic fibrosis were radically different from Tay-Sachs disease
and that the Dor Yeshorim expansion was truly a ‘‘moderate nightmare.’’ But in 2004, Rabbi Ekstein remained proud of the fact that
the Gaucher’s test was still offered: ‘‘We now test for nine different diseases, with the option of testing for Gaucher’s disease, a
condition that is not always severe and one that can be treated, but
only at great expense.’’ For Ekstein, the high price of drug therapy
and the greed of pharmaceutical companies were sufficient reason to keep offering the test.111
A crucial difference between the two diseases was this: Although Gaucher’s disease (type I) had been recently integrated
into a Jewish sense of group identity, it was not freighted with
the same meanings as Tay-Sachs. It did not connote the threat
of the Jewish people’s disappearance or a legacy of suffering and
pain. For Ekstein, the tension over whether to prevent births of
Gaucher’s babies highlighted a clash between business and community perspectives. For him, any limits on a group’s power to
manage its gene pool and to shape its genetic destiny should be
determined by the ethos and values of the group itself.
the perils of genetic matchmaking
By the early 1990s, the prevention of Tay-Sachs disease in Jewish communities stood as an exemplar of the success of community-based prevention programs in general. As such, it is quite
understandable that the architects of the Dor Yeshorim would seek
to build on the prevention model that had helped to reduce rates
of the fatal disease. But this image of community control shifted
in the 1990s, and what had been regarded as a model program also
came to symbolize the misuse of genetic information.
The expansion of genetic disease prevention programs proved
Eradicating a ‘‘Jewish Gene’’: Tay-Sachs Disease [55]
controversial for various reasons, among them the fact that new
knowledge was constantly reshaping the meaning and the symbolism of all diseases. In the age of genetic medicine, with new information constantly becoming available about a widening range
of obscure genetic conditions, TSD evolved from an archetype—
the prime example of a preventable genetic disease for which testing was desirable—into an anomalous disease so lethal and tragic
that it no longer stood as an appropriate model for the prevention of other genetic maladies. To understand the controversies
regarding the Dor Yeshorim, then, we must look to these changing meanings and contexts: to developments in the identification
of nonfatal, chronic genetic diseases, to cultural ideas about the
meaning of these disorders in various communities, and to a shift
in focus to groups other than the Ultra-Orthodox Jewish communities that had created and embraced the Dor Yeshorim.
A wide array of actors and forces shaped the success or failure
of genetic disease prevention efforts. The imperatives of prevention (‘‘if you have a test, use it’’) continued to appeal to patients
and practitioners alike. Michael Kaback noted that ‘‘this mentality, unfortunately, has been fostered in some degree by the
scientific community.’’ 112 To be sure, disease testing was also a
money-making enterprise (as was drug development). But in the
end, scientific developments, economic interests, religious ideals,
and the social dynamics of family and community life combined
to alter the path traveled by each genetic illness.113 Gaucher’s disease might resemble Tay-Sachs in some ways, but in the broader
cultural context they are profoundly different kinds of pathology
traversing different pathways.
In the cultural terms of the day, the movement to eradicate
TSD in the 1970s and 1980s was a success story—one that stood
in stark contrast to other prevention efforts. It was an exemplary
case of genetic information positively applied to the eradication of
disease, an affirmation that scientific intervention can be carried
out in a way that respects community values and cultural selfdetermination. To this day it is often contrasted with the more
[56] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
angry and contentious story of sickle cell disease testing in the
1970s (discussed in chap. 3), which many in the black community
saw as an attempt to coerce black families into having fewer children. In both black and Jewish communities, success and failure
in the fight against genetic disease hinged on crucial differences
in how communities perceived the risks and promises of testing,
how society portrayed the disorders, how experts made their cases
for treatment or prevention, and how communities responded to
new scientific knowledge.
The story of the Dor Yeshorim makes abundantly clear how
ideas about the proper uses of genetic information changed dramatically between the 1970s and the 1990s as society itself
changed, as scientific discoveries proliferated, as questions regarding the role of governments arose, as crises of ethnic identity emerged, and as the understanding of disease mechanisms
evolved. Far more than ethnic group identity was at work in shaping the story of Tay-Sachs disease. A wide range of other factors—
scientists and their ideals, the interests of particular communities,
the specific characteristics of the disease experience—accounted
for its trajectory over time.
In the end, Tay-Sachs disease and Gaucher’s were superficially
similar and yet profoundly different, not only as experienced by
patients and in their biology but also in their demographics, in
their histories, and (perhaps most important) in their political,
economic, and cultural meanings. Despite their kinship as genetic diseases, they raised profoundly different questions about
risk, therapeutic choice, and group identity. Moreover, their contrasting trajectories affirm that the promise of scientific innovation has had radically different implications for the management
of different genetic disorders over the decades. From the discovery
of lipid storage disorders and new understandings of Hex-A deficiencies, to the rise, fall, and resurgence of enzyme replacement
therapy, to the advent of the biotechnology industry, the paths of
TSD and Gaucher’s also illustrate that the very terms we use to
characterize these disorders (e.g., the phrase genetic disease) convey
Eradicating a ‘‘Jewish Gene’’: Tay-Sachs Disease [57]
very little about the diverse viewpoints, cultural complexities, and
group notions of suffering represented by disease.
Can familiar truisms about race biology, ethnicity, or culture
capture the complexity of the story of Tay-Sachs disease? The
issues revolving around the management of the disease go well
beyond racial or cultural concerns, for the story raises fundamental questions about community, identity, and the dream of genetic medicine. How do groups associated with certain diseases
see themselves in the world? How do they envision their health
risks, and how do they seek to manage their imagined futures?
Moving beyond simplistic pronouncements about race, ethnicity,
and culture, these are the crucial questions to consider as we seek
to understand the implications of genetic innovation in a diverse
society.
What is the appeal of the Dor Yeshorim for Ultra-Orthodox
Jews? The key issues continue to be survival, group cohesion,
and self-determination. And what can we learn from the controversy in the 1990s over the organization’s plans to expand testing from Tay-Sachs to Gaucher’s disease and to cystic fibrosis?
It reveals that diseases are evolving cultural constructs, symbols
with multiple meanings; and it shows how one group’s desire
for self-determination through disease prevention could be perceived as an attack on the values and prerogatives of those outside the group. The episode also highlights one of the enduring anxieties about the age of genetic medicine: the fear that the
more we learn about genetic diseases, the better we get at testing for genetic flaws (in adults, in infants, in fetuses), and the
more we embrace ‘‘preventive therapy,’’ the more likely it becomes
that even the best-intentioned methods of combating genetic disease will mutate into coercive control. Finally, the TSD story highlights the stunning ease with which Americans can racialize identity (using terms like Jewish genetic disease), ignoring the profound
inadequacies of such concepts and the enormous diversity within
groups.114
[58] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
The story of Tay-Sachs disease highlights the many paradoxes
of genetic testing for disease prevention. By the 1980s and 1990s,
experts acknowledged that prevention was not always the best
approach. Writing in the New England Journal of Medicine in 1987,
one physician acknowledged that prevention was a complex cultural undertaking: ‘‘Given some pessimism regarding prevention
and the fact that preventive approaches would not be universally acceptable because of differing moral views, what are the
prospects for therapy?’’ He continued, ‘‘It is hoped that progress
in molecular biology will improve the clinical outlook over the
next decade.’’ 115 Such experts looked expectantly toward a future
with improved enzyme infusion, transplantation, and gene therapy. Yet the march of prevention would not be halted, stimulating ever more complex controversies. New technologies in embryo manipulation created new dilemmas about the selection of
traits in utero. In early 1994, for example, newspapers reported
that Virginia physicians working with a Jewish couple had for the
first time tested fertilized eggs for Tay-Sachs. Of the four eggs,
three ‘‘were free of the genetic defect and were implanted in [the
woman’s] uterus.’’ One developed into a healthy baby. The breakthrough threatened to open another Pandora’s box by offering parents a wider selection of traits that verged on enhancement rather
than therapy. Asked about this expansion of the prevention approach, ethicist John Fletcher of the University of Virginia voiced
concern: ‘‘Once you start manipulating genes in the embryo you
could move from treating the disease to affecting characteristics
that don’t have anything to do with the disease, like skin color,
height, weight.’’ 116
As we turn in the next two chapters from Tay-Sachs to cystic fibrosis and sickle cell disease, we see even more clearly how
each was traveling its own road, buffeted by different debates over
race, ethnicity, and the promise of innovation. These dramatically
different therapeutic paths have also reflected distinct notions of
risk, group identity, and appropriate therapy, as well as starkly different notions of family and community. The Dor Yeshorim’s asEradicating a ‘‘Jewish Gene’’: Tay-Sachs Disease [59]
sociation of cystic fibrosis with Jewish people in the 1990s highlighted another tension as well. As Americans were learning of
an array of ‘‘Jewish genetic diseases,’’ the scientific and popular
media widely characterized cystic fibrosis as a ‘‘white disease,’’ the
most common lethal genetic disease afflicting Caucasians worldwide. The notion that CF was also prevalent among Ashkenazic
Jews would have puzzled some Americans. Was CF in fact a ‘‘white
disease,’’ was it a ‘‘Jewish genetic disease,’’ or did it have a broader
cultural profile than either term implied? And regardless of who
suffered from it and which groups identified with it, was it wise
to prevent CF babies from being born when major advances (such
as gene therapy) seemed to be just around the corner?
[60] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
2
Risky Business in White America
gene therapy and other ventures
in the treatment of cystic fibrosis
In 1993, people with cystic fibrosis (CF) stood at
a crossroads. ‘‘Gene Therapy Begins for Fatal Lung Disease,’’ announced the headlines.1 CF patients could look back over decades
of improvements in care that had boosted their life expectancy
and forward to the almost unbelievable promise of an imminent
cure. Francis Collins, director of the National Human Genome Research Institute and a geneticist who played a key role in identifying the CF gene, was optimistic about the promise of gene therapy.
As we saw in chapter 1, he regarded efforts to prevent the birth
of CF babies as a ‘‘moderate nightmare,’’ especially given the new
hope of cure.2 The architects of the Dor Yeshorim screening program for Tay-Sachs disease had recently suggested expanding the
service to include CF, generating a clash of perspectives on the best
way to manage such diseases. To be sure, CF was still a deadly genetic disease. Experts who hailed gene therapy in the 1990s often
described CF as ‘‘the most common fatal inherited disease . . .
among Caucasians,’’ using an expansive and vague term to signal
the broad reach of the disease across populations of light-skinned
peoples.3 Such seemingly innocuous references to race signaled
that this genetic disease belonged to white people more than to
others and that cures were on the way.
An elaborate and often contradictory conversation took shape
in the 1990s about the links between cystic fibrosis and white,
European, or Caucasian identity. Researchers knew that among
the staggering number of gene mutations responsible for CF—
more than a thousand, by some measures—one particular mu-
tation in the CF gene, called delta F 508 (DF508), accounted for
roughly two-thirds of all CF cases.4 Researchers detected a high
prevalence of this gene mutation in geographical Europe, spanning from Algeria to the Netherlands and from Portugal to Turkey,
and they theorized that the gene was an index of the prevalence
of European, Caucasian, or white genes—making DF508, in their
minds, a particularly European gene. Although the mutation accounted for only two-thirds of all CF patients, it became a kind
of proxy for studying the transmission of a ‘‘European identity.’’
In one South American study, for example, researchers analyzed
large variations in DF508 frequency across the region: ‘‘The overall
frequency . . . in Latin America is 47.7% . . . and 48% in Hispanic
patients from USA . . . but it varies from the lowest frequency in
Chile (29.2%) up to 62% in Argentina.’’ For them, the variation
in DF508 prevalence reflected ‘‘different percentages of Caucasian
population’’ across Latin America, with the Argentines presumably being the most European.5 Such studies slipped effortlessly
between seeing DF508 as European, as Caucasian, and as simply a
proxy for white.
Was there in fact a clear relationship between cystic fibrosis,
the DF508 gene, and white identity? Even across Europe the frequency of the DF508 mutation was remarkably varied. One study
suggested that the mutation ‘‘shows the highest relative frequency
in Denmark (87.2%).’’ 6 Elsewhere in northern and central Europe
the frequency hovered around 72.8 percent. At the same time,
however, the percentage in Finland was 46.2 percent, apparently
comparable to the rate among Hispanic CF patients in the United
States; and in Switzerland the figure was 43.2 percent. If the geographical spread of DF508 was taken seriously as an index of a
pure European identity, where would the Swiss and Finnish populations fit within this genetic portrait? The CF gene mutation and
CF itself became entangled with different ideas about Europeanness and whiteness in the United States, South America, and elsewhere.7 Wherever the topic of CF came up, efforts to link the dis[62] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
ease through the DF508 mutation to ‘‘European’’ identity resulted
in a kind of ethnic myth-making, the creation of diverse narratives
about national identity, and in each instance the meanings associated with the term European vary widely. Americans, as it turned
out, had their own reading of the race issue in CF.
For researchers like Collins, it was not race but the promise
of imminent cure that hung heavily in the air in the 1990s. With
the detection of genes causing cystic fibrosis, medical researchers looked forward to the day when CF patients—living longer
than ever before despite their lung and pancreatic symptoms and
their frequent infections—might be cured, relieved once and for
all from their condition. A genetics revolution seemed to be under
way, and researchers looked askance at the Dor Yeshorim model
for preventing CF babies, questioning the idea that preventing
such people from ever being born was the optimal solution to genetic disease, especially with the prospect of gene therapy apparently just around the corner.
In the minds of experts like Collins, cystic fibrosis stood at a
point quite different from the tragic and always fatal Tay-Sachs
disease. By 1993, CF, which had once been a high-mortality childhood disease, seemed increasingly controllable. As people with
CF grew through childhood and adolescence and often into adulthood, they coped constantly with heavy mucous secretions that
clogged the airways, the gastrointestinal tract, and the ducts of the
pancreas, the liver, and the urogenital tract (in males). The mucus
caused widespread tissue damage, creating an environment in the
lungs where bacteria could multiply too easily. Diabetes was a frequent complication. Digestion was impaired, and patients often
succumbed at an early age to lung failure or persistent and overwhelming infections. For many, hospitalization was a common
part of life. But over the decades, life expectancy had also risen
steadily, so that the child with CF who faced a bleak future in the
1950s would have faced far better odds of making it into adulthood in the 1990s.
Risky Business in White America: Cystic Fibrosis [63]
Therapeutics was a big part of the reason for this transformation in life chances for people with cystic fibrosis, and in the
1990s, media attention portrayed CF as a disease on the verge of a
breakthrough. CF patients seemed to be the most likely to benefit from the advent of a truly novel kind of medicine labeled gene
therapy. If the blood-brain barrier stood in the way of delivering
on the promise of enzyme replacement for neuropathies like TaySachs disease, with CF it was quite the contrary: the lungs and
respiratory system seemed tailor-made for gene therapy, a natural pathway through which a genetically altered virus could deliver
new genetic material to ailing parts of the body.8
In the mid-1980s, Americans began to hear glowing reports
about the prospects of gene therapy, with the great majority supporting the idea.9 Researchers experimented with different biological agents, documenting the safety and efficacy of specific
techniques for transferring genetic material into diseased body
parts. It remained to be proven, however, whether this ‘‘gene
transfer’’ would remedy the faulty genes responsible for the infirmity. Nevertheless, there was widespread hope that such trials
would one day in the near future make gene therapy a reality in
hospitals across the nation. National organizations like the Cystic
Fibrosis Foundation got behind these efforts. Signs of progress
were everywhere. In June 1994 Discover magazine noted that cystic fibrosis stood in a special place in the world of gene therapy
research. In the search to establish this modality as a viable therapeutic option, ‘‘cystic fibrosis may be just the opponent gene therapy has been looking for. It’s inherited, it’s deadly, and—most important—it’s responding.’’ 10 CF was widely seen as a promising
‘‘test case’’ for this experimental practice.11
Within a decade, however, the promise of gene therapy faded
as gene therapy experiments began to generate their own heated
controversies. Viewed in retrospect, the story of cystic fibrosis and
gene therapy in the 1990s was a compelling but brief flirtation,
an interlude filled with promise as well as with dangers and un[64] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
certainties. How should we manage genetic disease? How should
we deploy modern genetic knowledge in the name of improving
human health? Just as the story of Tay-Sachs disease and the Dor
Yeshorim exposed how the management of genetic disease could
be deeply entangled with questions of Jewish self-determination
and survival, with abortion politics, and with the vagaries of advances in diagnostics, so too did cystic fibrosis become inextricably entangled with its own politics—in this case, the politics of
entrepreneurism, business innovation, and hype. To look closely
at the history of CF is to explore not only the promise of gene therapy but also the growth of new biotechnology companies and the
hopes (and hype) of entrepreneurs who seized on the disease as a
way to demonstrate a promising new model of cure for a vast market of patients. The story of CF also makes clear that the advent of
gene therapy was part of a longer history of innovation, promise,
and risk-taking by patients and their families.
Even as they championed gene therapy, researchers acknowledged that their promises were optimistic and forward-looking.
‘‘Twenty years from now,’’ predicted gene therapy pioneer
W. French Anderson in 1996, ‘‘gene therapy will have revolutionized the practice of medicine. Virtually every disease will have
gene therapy as one of its treatments.’’ In particular, cystic fibrosis experts hoped that gene therapy would correct the chloridetransport defect in the lung epithelial cells, a significant problem
in the CF patient that results in the buildup of mucus, lung deterioration, infections, and early death. But experts like Anderson
admitted that even if successful, gene therapy would be only one
among a spectrum of necessary treatments, for CF or any other
disease.12 Despite the public hype, gene therapy would not be a
stand-alone cure. Researchers knew that gene therapy could not
address some of the typical lung problems in the CF patient and
would certainly not repair damaged lung tissue.13 They knew that
using an adenovirus to deliver genetic material to the lungs would
not address problems in other parts of the body such as the malRisky Business in White America: Cystic Fibrosis [65]
absorption of nutrients, the resulting problems from poor nutrition that were characteristic of CF, and the pancreatic deficiency.
They acknowledged that it would not treat the complications—infertility (in males), liver disease, diabetes, or osteoporosis—that
sometimes afflict people with CF. Moreover, they also knew that
inserting genetically altered viruses into the lungs posed health
risks. Yet the promise remained great.
How can the exalted expectations and widely disseminated optimism about gene therapy as a cure for cystic fibrosis be reconciled with the apparent reality that the disease was far too complex for gene therapy alone to tackle effectively? In retrospect it
seems that in the best possible scenario, gene therapy would have
armed physicians with a new tool to prevent mucus buildup and
lung infections in people with CF, possibly extending their lives by
decades. It would have been a quantum leap forward in the treatment of the lung problems associated with CF, but not a cure.
Nonetheless, during the 1990s gene therapy for CF was frequently
portrayed as a cure-all. As one pulmonary specialist noted, ‘‘In the
next decade, we are going to see a revolution in treatment for this
disease. We can really truly think about a cure.’’ 14
Was the media to blame for this gap between the promise and
the likely reality of the gene therapy revolution? The press routinely inflated the curative potential of any new therapy and invariably erred on the side of optimism when reporting on research.
Their catering to both professional and lay hopes for a healthier
future often came at the expense of accuracy and detail. But we
are less concerned with assigning responsibility for the hyperbolic
reports than with understanding the historical forces and interests that shaped the hope and the hype. In what follows we look
closely at the ideologies and interests that brought patients with
cystic fibrosis to this critical and promising juncture.15
The willingness of some families, patients, and researchers
to embrace the risks associated with this kind of innovation is
best understood in a broader historical and cultural context, for
their faith in high risks and great rewards stands in sharp con[66] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
trast to the understandings of risk in the stories of Tay-Sachs disease and (as we shall see) sickle cell disease. Why was this risky
therapy elevated in stature at this particular time in professional
and popular discourse about CF? Why were ambiguity, confusion,
and complexity played down in favor of hype and risk taking? In
order to answer such questions, we delve into the long history
of cystic fibrosis: the interactions between families and doctors,
their emerging shared sense of faith in a steady yet frustrating
therapeutic progress, the growing focus on alleviating the deadly
lung symptoms of CF, and the ways in which the double-edged
advances of antibiotics and transplants laid the groundwork and
stoked huge investments in gene therapy.
The gene therapy hype expressed a particular worldview about
the transformative possibilities of modern medicine, a worldview
that had powerful appeal not just for cystic fibrosis patients and
their families but also for pharmaceutical innovators and for the
white Americans who were commonly portrayed as the primary
victims of the disease. News articles routinely pointed to the disease’s impact on majority Americans.16 Reviewing Alex, Frank Deford’s 1983 book about his daughter’s death from CF, one writer
in the Washington Post put it this way: ‘‘It’s a white person’s disease, the white version of sickle-cell anemia. It strikes once in
every 1,000 live births, and one in twenty whites is a carrier.’’ 17 Deford, an articulate spokesman for the CF cause, represented it as
‘‘a genetic disease, carried almost exclusively by Caucasians, but
with little fluctuation in incidence anywhere in the white world.’’
This was not quite accurate, for the disease could be found in all
parts of the world; but to stress the white or Caucasian character of CF was to obscure its social and demographic complexity.
The actual variations mattered little to most readers. Deford concluded, ‘‘Apparently it’s been with us from antiquity.’’ 18 The message was clear: just as black people had sickle cell disease, white
people had cystic fibrosis, a disease that had taken the lead in the
race toward gene therapy.
Risky Business in White America: Cystic Fibrosis [67]
families and the historical trajectory
of cystic fibrosis care
Published in 1983, some six years before scientists had identified and cloned the cystic fibrosis gene, Frank Deford’s book about
his daughter documented the real-life challenges faced by families and the central role of doctors and drugs in their lives. Massage therapy, regular antibiotics, pneumonia, collapsed lungs, her
death at age eight—every detail of the life of Alex Deford as told
by her father unfolded in an intimate relationship with the Yale–
New Haven hospital system. ‘‘Between 1975 and 1976,’’ wrote her
father, ‘‘when she was going to nursery school and kindergarten
. . . [how] innocent I was . . . But at the time the medicines and
the treatments kept her on an even keel.’’ 19 At the time, he fully
expected that the medicines could continue to keep Alex fit, but
in the years afterward his daughter experienced the frequent ups
and downs of life with CF.
Through most of its history to date, cystic fibrosis has been
understood as a multifaceted problem, not unlike the one portrayed in Alex—a problem that called for an intimate and trusting
relationship between doctors and parents involved in the care of
their children. Yet each generation of patients has experienced CF
differently, and families, physicians, and clinical scientists have
framed different approaches to it over the years.20 In contrast with
Tay-Sachs disease, the discovery of which dated to the late nineteenth century, CF was a somewhat newer disease. Swiss pediatrician Guido Fanconi and his associates are typically credited
with identifying CF in 1936 in their characterization of a group
of patients with a ‘‘celiac disease’’ (a digestive disorder). However, it was Dorothy Anderson’s 1938 autopsy study of thirty-eight
patients at the Babies Hospital in New York City that gave CF its
name and, in the words of pioneering researcher Paul di Sant’ Agnese, ‘‘really put CF on the map as a distinct clinical entity.’’ 21
Anderson described the disease, which she called ‘‘cystic fibrosis
of the pancreas,’’ as a pancreatic disorder in small children char[68] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
acterized by a severe inability to absorb nutrients and potentially
treatable by proper nutrition. This understanding of the disease
ushered in the use of dietary supplements and nutritional interventions by families.22 In the 1940s, antibiotics took center stage,
delivering a new tool for managing the infections that afflicted
CF patients. In time this would become a critically important improvement, but it would also generate new problems in CF care.
Over time, cystic fibrosis took on many guises. Sidney Farber
renamed the disease in the 1940s after uncovering additional features. The new name was mucoviscidosis, a term reflecting Farber’s
understanding of the disease as a systemic one stemming from
viscous secretions produced by the mucous glands throughout
the body.23 Nevertheless, diagnosis continued to rely upon identification of pancreatic insufficiency until the mid-1950s. It was
then that Paul di Sant’ Agnese and his colleagues first noted another feature that became crucial in diagnosis: electrolytes in the
sweat of CF patients were elevated.24 With each discovery came a
gradual realization that CF was a complex clinical puzzle and that
distinguishing between its primary and secondary features would
remain a key conceptual challenge. It was at once a disease of malabsorption, a lung disorder, a pancreatic disease, and a malady
defined by an overproduction of mucus.
During the first two decades of its history, cystic fibrosis thus
emerged as a multifaceted phenomenon with an ambiguous, but
possibly systemic, character. ‘‘In light of the ‘newness’ of the disease,’’ wrote one specialist in 1963, ‘‘it is understandable that
those who are studying it and caring for patients should not be
in full agreement on all aspects.’’ 25 Diagnosis alone was a rapidly
evolving practice, with new insights constantly reshaping doctors’
ideas about CF’s prevalence.
It was only in the 1950s and 1960s that the electrolyte sweat
test began to establish that the disease was much more prevalent
than previously thought, and only then did the underlying disease
afflicting an earlier generation of Alex Defords become visible as
such to doctors. A particularly telling article on cystic fibrosis and
Risky Business in White America: Cystic Fibrosis [69]
its treatment appeared in Time magazine in 1954. Entitled simply
‘‘‘New’ Disease,’’ the story portrayed CF as a little known childkiller:
In the wards of Children’s Medical Center in Boston last week,
or making regular visits to the outpatient clinic, were 2000
youngsters suffering from a mysterious disease with a forbidding name: cystic fibrosis of the pancreas. At Babies Hospital in
Manhattan there were seven beds and 80 outpatients; attending
Los Angeles’ Children’s Hospital were 150 known or suspected
cases. Across the country are thousands of other victims, most
of them probably unrecognized. For to most doctors, pancreatic fibrosis (also known as mucoviscidosis) is a ‘‘new’’ disease.
According to CF specialist Carl Doershuk, this notice in a popular
magazine was ‘‘undoubtedly the best public relations achievement
for CF up to that time.’’ 26 As so often happens, the popularization
of the ‘‘new’’ disease along with the new diagnostic test created a
rapidly growing population of visible CF patients.
As awareness of this new disease grew, patients, families, and
physicians grappled with the multidimensional challenges it
posed. What was the emerging picture of the disease? As di Sant’
Agnese wrote in 1964, ‘‘Most of [the children diagnosed with cystic fibrosis] eventually die in childhood, adolescence, or young
adulthood, of the chronic pulmonary involvement which usually
dominates the clinical picture and determines the fate of the patient.’’ (From the patient’s perspective, the lung problems were
the most severe and life threatening aspect of CF.) Physicians
were well aware that more and more children with CF were living
longer, facing the real possibility of living into their twenties. One
study suggested that before 1963, fully half of any cohort of CF
sufferers could expect to die within two or three years, but antibiotics, physical therapy drainage, and the use of aerosols had
pushed the figure to thirteen or even twenty years. Scientists increasingly understood that a range of new problems would con[70] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
tinue to plague these patients as they grew up. As di Sant’ Agnese
noted, ‘‘Despite its name, so-called cystic fibrosis of the pancreas
is in reality a generalized disorder’’ that would pose a continuing
and evolving threat to a patient population growing older with the
years.27 In this shifting field much of the professional literature
focused on sharpening the diagnostic understanding, developing
knowledge of the biochemical bases of CF, and meeting the unfolding challenge of comprehensive management for people with
this multidimensional disorder.
By the mid-1960s, cystic fibrosis was no longer ‘‘new,’’ nor was
it ‘‘rare.’’ It had become the subject of increasing public discussion
and the focal point of a new comprehensive approach to patient
care. As early as 1963 the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation, which had
been founded in the early 1950s, promoted ‘‘the overriding importance . . . of early diagnosis and prompt institution of a complex
and comprehensive care regimen.’’ 28 According to the Matthews
Comprehensive Treatment Program—first developed in the 1950s
and increasingly the standard in the 1960s—ideal CF care would
involve an array of specialists and would place the patient and
family at the center of a program of aggressive disease management, with a strong focus on anticipating and preventing problems.29 This ideal of comprehensive care was driven not only by
the national organization, but by the changing relationship between patients, families, and caregivers. Perhaps most crucial, it
required that the family become intimately involved in day-to-day
care.
Comprehensive care also required resources, and to some extent it was made possible by the broadening social commitments
of these years. As historians have noted, the 1960s were a time
when patients, families, regulators, and politicians were all pressing for attention to the wide-ranging challenges posed by a host of
new health problems from cancer to kidney failure. Increasingly,
patients demanded responsiveness to the social and psychological dimensions of illness as well as to the biological aspects.30
Risky Business in White America: Cystic Fibrosis [71]
In CF, the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation became a key force advocating for patients and families. These pressures to focus on the
patient’s and family’s perspective continued to grow in the 1970s
and 1980s, at times in subtle conflict with the aims of CF researchers and practitioners. Nevertheless, the creation, as early as 1960,
of medical centers specifically devoted to cystic fibrosis points to
the power of this disease to command resources that were unavailable to other groups.31
According to the comprehensive care model, parents were the
primary caregivers in the front lines of disease management. For
example, the 1963 Cystic Fibrosis Foundation’s Guide to Diagnosis and Management characterized therapeutics as supplementary
to home care. This and other such handbooks suggested that
therapeutic interventions carried out in the home—whether specialized mist tent therapies, postural drainage of mucus, coaching children in breathing exercises, or encouraging them in their
physical activity—were of crucial importance; and these practices
helped shape parents’ appreciation for what therapeutic innovations could mean for their children.32 Other studies suggested that
lifestyle, exercise, sleep patterns, breathing and lung capacity as
well as family relationships could all shape the patient’s experience. Such concerns about the cystic fibrosis experience would
dominate medical and scientific writing from the 1960s onward.
Facing the formidable challenges of in-home care for babies
and young children with cystic fibrosis, parents turned to physicians for coaching and came to see therapeutic innovation as their
friend and partner. Clinical centers offered a specialized resourcerich brand of what parents were encouraged to do at home. As one
article noted, ‘‘When a physician embarks on the treatment of a
child with cystic fibrosis, he simultaneously undertakes the treatment and involvement of the entire family.’’ Family medicine was
just beginning to take shape as a subspecialty, and the direction
of CF care meshed neatly with this trend. As the article continued,
‘‘This current view maintains that the family of the CF child has
[72] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
to be enlisted actively in the overall treatment and therapeutic
planning for the child and integrated into a smoothly functioning
team.’’ 33 Patients, physicians, and parents were part of the same
team, sharing a common perspective—this idea was central to CF
care in the 1970s. And this standard of care was being realized, for
more and more patients, precisely because of the resources available in the comprehensive care setting. Handbooks and studies
emphasized that this style of care was crucial because of the complex nature of CF. The best therapy, it was said, involved securing
the cooperation of child and parent, ‘‘since both child and parent
carry an unusual responsibility for the patient’s well-being.’’ 34
Throughout the following decades comprehensive care would
be hailed as the single most important factor in the dramatic improvement in the life expectancy and health of people with cystic fibrosis.35 Meanwhile, research studies produced better methods of dealing with the daily task of clearing airways of mucus.36
Other studies examined the pros and cons of different agents for
breaking up lung sputum.37 Yet others explored the changing lifestyle challenges faced by CF patients as they became older, touching upon problems of reproduction and fertility.38 By the 1970s,
such advances alongside intensive home-based care had made it
possible for more and more CF children to live into adolescence
and adulthood.39 Indeed, chapter after chapter of Frank Deford’s
Alex testifies to the intense involvement of families in day-to-day
care. Deford recalled, for example, that even though he was skeptical about the benefits, he administered postural drainage therapy
perhaps two thousand times in eight years, his wife even more.40
In every disease, a particular doctor-patient-family relationship
takes shape. In each case, a particular ethos evolves. In the history of cystic fibrosis, comprehensive management was a major
cultural development, a key factor shaping sentiments and future
expectations about medical innovation and establishing a framework for how doctors, patients, and families thought about their
relationship with each other.
Risky Business in White America: Cystic Fibrosis [73]
a panethnic lung disease? the new
cultural politics of cystic fibrosis
Who were these cystic fibrosis patients and families? Did they
have an ethnic or racial profile? And what were the key aspects of
their experiences? The road from comprehensive care to CF gene
therapy involved many shifts in scientific thinking and much political debate about who these patients were and which aspects of
the disease were the most important. Whereas medical scientists
in the 1960s understood CF first and foremost as a comprehensive and systemic problem, in the age of gene therapy the disease
came to be considered primarily in terms of its genetic and pulmonary features. These two different understandings highlight the
cultural perceptions of two different eras not only about why CF
patients were dying but about who they were—white, black, or
multiethnic.
In the 1960s and 1970s, even as comprehensive management
focused researchers, clinicians, patients, and their families on an
imposing array of clinical challenges, scientists often disagreed
about the primary character of cystic fibrosis.41 Raising a child
with CF from infancy through adolescence continued to be a formidable undertaking. Neither families nor experts emphasized
the ‘‘genetic’’ features of the disease. To be sure, they understood
it to be a ‘‘hereditary’’ disorder, but this way of thinking did not
capture what they saw as its fundamental biological underpinnings. Rather, scientists strongly believed that the disease needed
to be addressed at the metabolic and biochemical level—that is,
that mucus buildup throughout the body was the crucial and primary issue, and that underlying biochemical abnormalities were
responsible for the systemic problem. The age of comprehensive
care dictated that there would be considerable doubt about the
wisdom of giving precedence to one feature of CF over others, or
for that matter of thinking of the disorder principally as a ‘‘lung
disease.’’
[74] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
According to the prevailing view, studying the underlying
mechanisms of mucus accumulation would ‘‘contribute to a more
fundamental understanding of the clinical problem.’’ 42 Therefore, throughout the 1950s and 1960s, researchers at the National
Institutes of Health (NIH) tried to unravel the mysteries of cystic fibrosis by studying ‘‘the basic biochemical, biophysical and
physiological disturbances implicated.’’ The research agenda addressed three features: the ‘‘triad of chronic pulmonary disease,
pancreatic deficiency and abnormally high sweat electrolytes.’’ As
Paul di Sant’ Agnese put it, ‘‘In patients with cystic fibrosis there
is a ready-made experimental model in which to study the interaction between mucopolysaccharides and electrolytes.’’ In this
view, CF research was driven by the assumption that these biochemical substances and their interaction were the underlying
keys to the puzzle of the disease. The research findings would
reach far beyond the ‘‘fight against CF,’’ di Sant’ Agnese observed,
since studies on the disease ‘‘may also help to answer some of
the unsolved questions of physiology, with broad implications in
human pathology.’’ 43 For such researchers, then, CF was part of
a broader research agenda; and there was a powerful sense that
studying the underlying mechanisms of biochemical imbalances
in the body, abnormal mucus production, and organ damage in CF
would be applicable to CF patient care as well as to general questions in physiology and metabolic disease.
But research agendas and ideas about the true nature of the
disorder were also shaped by politics and by the competition for
resources. Many diseases vied for public attention and federal resources in the early 1970s. Legislative debate swirled over a wide
range of medical issues, from national health insurance to the war
on cancer. Sickle cell disease legislation (to address a hereditary
disease associated with African Americans) was winding its way
through Congress en route to President Nixon’s desk for signing.
Such ‘‘ethnic’’ diseases as Tay-Sachs and sickle cell disease had
taken on powerful cultural and political meanings. Debates about
Risky Business in White America: Cystic Fibrosis [75]
funding often turned into arguments about national research priorities and about privilege, equality, and fairness in addressing the
concerns of diverse groups in America.
Increasing legislative interest in disease and health in the 1970s
introduced a political angle to the question of what cystic fibrosis
was, whom it affected, and how research should be carried out.
Indeed, when Congress took up legislation in 1972 to increase research funding for heart, lung, blood vessel, and blood disorders,
CF became part of this larger political discussion. One question
that emerged was whether cystic fibrosis was a ‘‘lung disorder’’
entitled to funding under this bill. Or was it best understood
as a ‘‘metabolic disorder’’? Was it a white disease or a panethnic
concern? In this context, some critics suggested, the scientific
community’s focus on electrolytes, mucopolysaccharides, and underlying mechanisms seemed far removed from the practical concerns of families and patients.
Legislators heard testimony from a number of researchers, and
the politicized atmosphere revealed that the multidimensional
disease could mean very different things to different people. Some
researchers insisted that cystic fibrosis should not be included
in lung disease legislation because, as one physician put it, ‘‘the
disease is a metabolic disorder and the biochemical disturbance
which is responsible for the clinical manifestations [is] not confined to the lungs.’’ 44 This view, which was the standard research
view, was seconded by NIH director Robert Marston, who insisted
that extensive research on CF was already being supported by
the National Institute of Arthritis and Metabolic Diseases.45 Only
four years earlier, in 1968, legislation had provided strong support for comprehensive pulmonary care facilities around the country, which everyone acknowledged had benefited cystic fibrosis
patients greatly.
Indeed, some observers regarded cystic fibrosis as a relatively
privileged disease. For example, during the legislative hearings regarding research funds for sickle cell disease, advocates for the
new program had pointed to the vast discrepancies between pri[76] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
vate funding for CF and for sickle cell disease. As one researcher
noted, ‘‘In 1967, there were an estimated 1,155 new cases of [sickle
cell] disease, 1,206 of cystic fibrosis, 813 of muscular dystrophy . . .
Yet volunteer organizations raised $1.9 million for cystic fibrosis
and $7.9 million for muscular dystrophy, but less than $100,000
for sickle cell anemia.’’ 46 So as Congress debated the new Heart,
Lung, Blood Vessel, and Blood Bill in 1972, advocates for CF found
themselves competing for attention with various disadvantageddisease constituencies. Clearly, if cystic fibrosis was to hold on to
existing support and secure further funding under the new legislation, advocates would have to readjust its image as a privileged
disease and also recharacterize its fundamental biology.
Dr. Giulio Barbero, a CF physician at the University of Pennsylvania and a spokesman for the National Cystic Fibrosis Research
Foundation, understood the need for such a reframing at a time
like this, when the major government initiative that had provided
funding for pulmonary disease programs, including CF care, faced
cutbacks. In his testimony before the House subcommittee, Barbero disputed the prevailing characterization of the disease as articulated by NIH director Robert Marston. He insisted that cystic
fibrosis was one among a spectrum of ‘‘children’s lung diseases
. . . [in which] many contributing causes, genetic and non-genetic,
known and unknown, are involved.’’ It would be, he argued, ‘‘unsound to separate out cystic fibrosis . . . It is a lung disease,’’ and
as such it warranted funding under the new legislation.47 This depiction of CF was at once opportunistic and pragmatic. It focused
on what patients and families believed to be the most important
aspect of the disease, as opposed to the underlying mechanisms
that preoccupied scientists.
In making his appeal, however, Barbero reduced the symptomatological complexity of cystic fibrosis to a caricature. His argument transformed one of the central clinical manifestations of
the disease—its devastating pulmonary problems—into the only
problem: ‘‘Cystic fibrosis is the most serious pulmonary disease
of man; it acts as a key model in understanding the research asRisky Business in White America: Cystic Fibrosis [77]
pects for pulmonary disease, and therefore must exist in some
juxtaposition to the spectrum of understanding . . . pulmonary
disease in man.’’ 48 Speaking for the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation,
whose lobbying efforts had always been strong, and to some extent for patients, Barbero implied that the tendency of researchers to characterize CF as ‘‘a metabolic disorder and a biochemical
disturbance’’ was far too rigid, too removed from clinical realities
and the actual experience of the disease.49 In the end, his argument persuaded legislators to focus on the patient’s experiences
rather than on the scientific questions stressed in testimony from
the NIH establishment figures, and CF was covered under the new
funding. Not surprisingly, at that very moment the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation was promoting its 1972 poster child as a ‘‘lungdamaged’’ patient living with the burden of a fatal inherited disorder.50
Barbero’s testimony touched on all the themes that would continue to be part of the reframing of cystic fibrosis—its biology,
its true demographics, its impact on families and children, the
proper research agenda for the disease, and the growing role of
funding agencies and financial interests in establishing this
agenda—with one telling difference: he chose to emphasize the
panethnic rather than the white face of cystic fibrosis. In his testimony Barbero compared CF with another newly politicized highprofile disease, sickle cell disease (SCD). Only months earlier SCD
had gained national attention as a hereditary disorder prevalent in
African-American communities. Congress was preparing to pass
the National Sickle Cell Anemia Control Act to provide funding for
treatment, research, and counseling for SCD patients and families.51 In this context, Barbero reminded lawmakers that CF carriers were more prevalent than SCD carriers, and he emphasized
that CF was also a significant concern in the black population. He
did not present it as a ‘‘Caucasian’’ disease, as scientists would
do in the 1980s and 1990s. Such a framing would not have resonated in the political atmosphere of the early 1970s as it did in
later years. Thus, Barbero highlighted that while 5 percent of the
[78] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
total population were CF carriers, 2 percent of the black population were CF carriers.52
In the 1970s, when many Americans were focusing on remedies
for racial injustice and the disenfranchisement of African Americans, physicians and advocates for cystic fibrosis patients chose
not to publicly frame it as a ‘‘white’’ disease. The choice is hardly
surprising. Such terminology would have done little to mobilize
public support and legislative sympathy in a decade when the political impetus was to remedy the effects of racial and social privilege.The push was on for national health insurance, for legislation
to make kidney dialysis more accessible to all Americans, to fund
research and health care for sickle cell disease and for thalassemia
(prevalent among Greek and Italian Americans), and so on. In this
context, though many acknowledged the high rates of CF among
white Americans, advocates also highlighted its more complex
ethnic profile.53 A long list of articles explored manifestations of
the disease in black Americans and in other ethnic and nonwhite
groups.54 The cultural framing of CF, in the 1970s as in the 1990s,
was sensitive to the social and cultural context of the times.
Over the following decades, political, scientific, and clinical
agendas as well as patients’ concerns would continue to reframe
cystic fibrosis. Though the argument that CF was a lung disease
was clearly part of a political effort to bring CF under the umbrella
of the 1972 legislation, in subsequent years the lung problems associated with the disease would become increasingly central in
research and therapeutic management, particularly as the patient
population matured and grew in numbers.
Where would cystic fibrosis research and patient care go from
here? CF therapy was situated at a complex intersection in the
1970s. On one side were the new concerns of a maturing patient
group; on another side were different research paradigms that
tried to reduce the disease’s complexity to simple models; and on
yet another side were emerging business concerns bent on marketing innovative cures that pushed the limits of CF care. It is with
these forces in mind that we can understand the impact and meanRisky Business in White America: Cystic Fibrosis [79]
ing of three other innovations—antibiotic regimens, lung transplantations, and gene therapy—that would shape popular thinking about CF in the years between 1970 and 2000. Each modality
had its particular impact on patients’ lives and expectations. Each
one also reflected the agendas of CF specialists who were constantly refining their understanding of the biology of the disease
and their ideas about how best to help the patients and families. As
the stories of antibiotics, lung transplants, and gene therapy unfolded, however, they also revealed the ambiguities of therapeutic
innovation and the sometimes dramatic collision between patient
expectations, scientific research agendas, and business interests.
trading one disease for another: antibiotics,
transplantation, and frustrating progress
on the road to gene therapy
For much of the history of cystic fibrosis, progress also brought
frustrations. Constant improvements in CF care, from antibiotic
therapy to lung transplantation, bettered the situation of patients.
Yet the advances always seemed to be mixed blessings, ushering
in new challenges such as antibiotic-resistant organisms or extensive after-transplant health problems. Over time, these advances
also threatened to ensnare patients and researchers in economic
and ethical entanglements. Increasing longevity too brought new
challenges. The frustrations of progress became a key part of the
sensibility of CF patients and doctors, shaping how they weighed
therapeutic risks and how they embraced innovations like gene
therapy. Progress had been imperfect, they reasoned, but a cure
was ultimately achievable. It was a conceit that contrasted sharply
with current notions surrounding the cure of people with TaySachs disease and, as we shall see, people with sickle cell disease.
Beginning with the widespread production of penicillin and
the advent of synthetic antibacterial agents in the mid-1940s and
1950s, antibiotics assumed a central and problematic role in the
treatment of cystic fibrosis. Perceived as a revolutionary medicine,
[80] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
antibiotics allowed physicians to tackle a wide range of the bacterial infections that manifested themselves as pulmonary congestion in CF patients, including pneumonia and tuberculosis. But as
early as 1951 three researchers noted that ‘‘the enlarged chemical
and antibiotic armamentarium of the physician today has brought
increasing clinical importance to the Pseudomonas strain of organisms at all ages.’’ The drugs provided relief from lung infections
but also promoted the growth of resistant organisms. The authors continued, invoking simple laws of biology: ‘‘Any regimen
of long-continued therapy with a single antibacterial agent invites
the development of highly resistant organisms which may flourish
in an environment rendered more favorable by the absence of susceptible bacteria.’’ 55 Thus, even as penicillin and other drugs assumed an expanding role in CF management, physicians were becoming aware of the risks posed by these powerful new weapons.
From the outset, antibacterial therapy was a balancing act for
the clinician. Therapy was a subtle negotiation: use enough of the
drug to combat the infectious organisms that often colonize the
thick mucus in the lungs of CF patients, but not enough to encourage the proliferation of the more resistant bacterial strains.
In 1968, with an ever-increasing array of antibiotics coming onto
the market, researchers pointed out that the heavy use of penicillin had produced a new bacterial problem: ‘‘There is little doubt
that the establishment of [Pseudomonas aeruginosa] in the respiratory tract is encouraged by suppression of other bacteria by antibiotics.’’ 56 The struggle to control this bacterial strain was fast
becoming a fact of life for more and more CF patients. As Frank
Deford put it, ‘‘For all the research that has been done, there is as
yet no antibiotic to deal with pseudomonas, and once it begins to
march through the lungs, it multiplies with impunity and sweeps
everything in its path.’’ 57 Nevertheless, the trend toward the use
of more antibiotics, in increasing varieties, continued into the late
1970s.58
The problem was not the drugs, of course, but the way doctors
and patients had been using them. In the 1960s and early 1970s,
Risky Business in White America: Cystic Fibrosis [81]
assessments of antibacterial therapies were few in number, and
they were largely anecdotal and retrospective.59 The use of antibiotics to treat CF had ‘‘been more of a ritual . . . than a scientific approach.’’ 60 In the late 1970s, however, researchers began to
scrutinize these therapies more rigorously, and a new therapeutic
approach evolved. Instead of using a single preferred antibiotic,
practitioners began to alternate among different agents, timing
their interventions carefully so as to keep bacteria ‘‘off balance’’
and weighing the various agents (wide spectrum, narrow spectrum, oral, intravenous, etc.) against one another.
A tension regarding antibacterial care for cystic fibrosis arose
just as a new face of the CF patient was emerging. The disease
now affected growing numbers of adolescents and adults who
had survived their early years as CF children. It was also rising in
prevalence, partly because new screening techniques were identifying more patients. And it was attaining a higher social and political profile, thanks to the 1972 Heart, Lung, Blood Vessel, and
Blood Bill as well as the 1976 Genetic Disease Act. The number of
patients receiving care had more than doubled in ten years (from
an estimated 4,523 in 1965 to 10,489 in 1976).61 Doctors in this
period documented significant variation within this clinical population, as well as significant differences in patients’ responses
to antibacterial therapies, physiotherapy, and other therapeutics.
Amid this veritable explosion of treatment options, how was one
to determine the actual efficacy of antibacterial therapies? As one
author noted in 1978, ‘‘While it is accepted by many that the increased longevity of CF patients is strongly related to antibiotic
use, this has never been documented adequately.’’ 62
Were antibiotics the magic sword of CF care? Or was the sword
double-edged in some way? In the 1970s and early 1980s, numerous clinical trials were undertaken to determine the actual effect
of various antibiotics on pulmonary exacerbations (severe and
acute attacks) in CF patients. For example, the introduction of
ticarcillin (a semisynthetic penicillin derivative) prompted a comparative study of three particular alternatives: ‘‘ticarcillin alone,
[82] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
ticarcillin plus gentamicin, and gentamicin alone in [twentyeight] patients with CF.’’ 63 The scientific presumption of this
period was that the only way to control extreme variations in
clinical care was the double-blind placebo-controlled crossover
study.64 The imperative to do highly structured clinical trials
seemed obvious to researchers looking back over decades of drug
innovation and trying to evaluate wide variations in CF management. They questioned the impressionistic basis on which doctors
reported their failures and successes in antibacterial therapy for
CF.65 They saw themselves to some extent as reformers standing
in judgment on acute care and routine clinical practice, looking at
dosing implications and interactions among antibiotics.66 Antibiotics had created a brave new world of medical care, but one that
needed to be rationalized. The clinical trials of the late 1970s and
early 1980s set out to bring order to the increasing biological and
clinical complexity of CF and to help practitioners sort through
the drugs available for treating acute pulmonary exacerbations in
CF patients.
Many within this generation of researchers remained cautious
about the promise of breakthroughs or cures. Understanding that
even ‘‘miracle drugs’’ like antibiotics had their perils, they felt that
one goal of clinical research should be to regulate the use of innovative drugs—a position sharply opposed to that of the research
entrepreneurs who would later take up the torch of gene therapy.
The new clinical trials on antibiotic therapies served a slightly different function from earlier research on the disease’s underlying
mechanisms or research on the family’s role in CF care. Although
this antibiotics research was aimed at a rather limited problem
in clinical practice, it impinged nevertheless on a complex set of
social problems: how to cope with pharmacological abundance,
how to discipline individualism in medical practice, how to prevent the overuse of antibiotics, and how best to serve the increasingly adolescent cohort of CF patients who were altering the balance of family-centered care.
In the mid-1980s, as they looked back on the evolution of antiRisky Business in White America: Cystic Fibrosis [83]
bacterial therapy for cystic fibrosis, physicians and researchers
recognized that antibiotics were a double-edged sword. Some researchers, in view of the side effects of such ‘‘drugs of choice,’’
called for research into newer antibacterial drugs.67 Others expressed concern about the hypersensitivity of some CF patients
to semisynthetic penicillin.68 Still others pointed to the role of
antibiotics in the evolution of disturbing new infections in CF
patients, such as the increasing frequency of a new Pseudomonas
infection (P. cepacia) that posed even more formidable challenges
than P. aeruginosa.69 Some even questioned the basic premises and
efficacy of antibacterial therapy, proposing that antibiotic therapy
was not as important as intensive chest physiotherapy in CF management.70
In 1985, the pediatrician John Nelson commented perceptively
on the ironies of progress in CF care and the frustrating problems that had been created by the sheer abundance of new drugs.
If privilege and abundance had any downsides, this was one of
them. ‘‘Historically,’’ he explained, ‘‘patients with cystic fibrosis
have been given a variety of prophylactic regimens. It was very
common at one time to give tetracycline for a few months, then
chloramphenicol for a few months, and then other drugs for a
few months.’’ This regimen created an impression of control and
progress, and ‘‘patients were reported to do better [even though]
controlled studies were not done.’’ Although clinical trials tried
to remedy inconsistencies in care, many physicians continued to
resist standardization—and for good reasons. The complexity of
the disease and its variability from one patient to the next guaranteed that no single mode of therapy would ever be established
as a standard in CF antibacterial care. The ‘‘objective’’ guidance
offered by clinical drug trials could not dispel the difficulties of
managing the increasing biological complexity of CF. ‘‘The issue is
still clouded,’’ said Nelson. He, like many other physicians, understood well the limits of antibiotics and clinical trials and looked
forward to new approaches. He mused, ‘‘Perhaps when the basic
defect in cystic fibrosis is understood, the relationship of the host
[84] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
to the microorganism will be better understood.’’ Implicit in such
remarks was a quiet yearning for a breakthrough, perhaps even a
genetic breakthrough, as CF care moved away from staged prophylactic regimens.71
Increasingly, researchers conceived of cystic fibrosis as a respiratory disease, and their focus on antibiotics reinforced that
trend. The antibiotics revolution also introduced doctors to the
numerous drug companies with high economic stakes in CF care.
Certainly there were some researchers who held on to traditional
views of CF, arguing that ‘‘the pulmonary disease in CF was secondary to the pancreatic deficiency.’’ 72 But by the 1980s that
concept had been pushed into the background. Concerns about
antibacterial agents had also brought researchers into close relationships with representatives of the pharmaceutical industry, the
makers and marketers of these new products. Years later, when
the focus shifted to gene therapy, this relationship would advance
a step further: researchers would frequently become part of the
drug development team, acting as interested and invested intermediaries between patients and families, on one hand, and drug
production companies on the other. But for now, as frustrations
with the therapeutic status quo grew in the 1980s, another group
of specialists—the transplant surgeons—were busily promoting
their own revolution in CF care. The embrace of lung transplantation represented yet another feature of the gradual reinvention
of CF as a pulmonary disease.
The champions of lung transplantation looked back on the era
of antibiotics and concluded that the therapeutic gains for cystic fibrosis had run their course: progress had leveled off. ‘‘Aggressive palliative therapy remains the basis of treatment,’’ noted
one article in 1991. ‘‘However . . . the plateau has probably been
reached, and we need innovative treatments.’’ 73 Transplantation
seemed to point the way to the future of CF care, particularly in
view of the extended life span and new dilemmas facing people
with CF. ‘‘The median survival age in 1989 was 26 years, compared
to only 7 years in 1964,’’ noted one researcher. ‘‘The extended surRisky Business in White America: Cystic Fibrosis [85]
vival is due in part to more aggressive treatment of pulmonary disease and malnutrition.’’ Having succeeded in bringing increased
numbers of CF children into young adulthood, physicians and
patients confronted the new reality that ‘‘pulmonary disease remains the primary cause of morbidity and mortality in noninfant
CF patients.’’ 74 Fatal lung infections had come to be the most fearful reality of the disease.
To call cystic fibrosis a pulmonary disease was to focus, ever
more persistently, on remedies for lung deterioration. Despite the
gastrointestinal, pancreatic, and liver problems associated with
the disease, the lungs drew disproportionate attention from the
1970s onward. The reason was clear: increasingly, it was lung
problems that ultimately killed CF patients. Advances in antibacterial medicine had increased families’ expectations but had not
diminished their desperation. In this context, radical therapeutic gambits like lung transplantation could emerge as a viable
option for CF patients in the mid-1980s, promising new lives
and healthy lungs for ailing patients. ‘‘Lung transplantation’’ in
fact comprised a diverse array of innovative surgical procedures,
among them single-lung, double-lung, and heart-lung transplantation. The story of lung transplantation in cystic fibrosis provides further insight into how the threat of death still loomed over
CF patients and their families, and how patients often embraced
more daring therapeutic opportunities despite the risks.
From the start, transplantation was a bold and risky proposition. Transplant medicine boomed in the 1980s in the wake of
the discovery of immunosuppressive drugs to prevent rejection
of new organs.75 The first heart-lung transplantation (HLT) in
1981 set the stage for future lung transplantations in CF. At the
time, as one author noted, concerns were voiced about the applicability of HLT to cystic fibrosis: ‘‘Enthusiasm . . . was initially tempered by consideration of a number of potential problems unique
to the CF patient.’’ Among these were concerns that the CF defect might recur in the newly transplanted lungs. There was also
concern that immunosuppression would result in postoperative
[86] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
respiratory infections, and that control of the diabetes that was
common to CF patients would be made more difficult by posttransplantation steroid therapy. Of course, match donor organs—
truly a scarce commodity—also had to be found. Despite the difficulties, in 1984 a surgical team at the University of Pittsburgh
undertook the first heart-lung transplantation in a CF patient. The
effort failed, but it encouraged surgeons at other centers to try
similar lung transplant interventions.76
The HLT enterprise expanded rapidly from the mid-1980s
through the 1990s, bringing significant new income to health
centers around the nation. The advent of cyclosporine A, an immunosuppressive drug that helped prevent rejection of the implanted organs, had ushered in this new era for transplantation.
The high price of transplants made the enterprise a lucrative one.
At first, the cost of heart-lung transplants ranged from $75,000
to $125,000, and insurers balked at paying such staggering expenses.77 But as insured Americans pushed companies to pay, academic health centers came to see transplant medicine as a crucial
tool in building revenue, retaining preeminence in research and
health care, and becoming competitive in economically difficult
times.78
Transplantation reinforced the idea that the lung was the central therapeutic challenge in cystic fibrosis, but the transplant
option also focused attention on the painful end-of-life crises confronting patients with severe lung deterioration. Decade by decade, the maturing of the CF patient had pushed these issues out
of pediatrics and into the realm of adolescent and adult medicine,
where decisions about end-of-life care, risky therapeutics, and the
pros and cons of treatment options were approached very differently. Only a decade or so earlier, therapeutics had been shaped
by the challenges of rearing a child with cystic fibrosis.79 But by
the early 1990s, CF patients were now more often independent
adults grappling with profound concerns and willing to take significant risks. Parents too seemed increasingly willing to incur
greater risks for their children with CF.
Risky Business in White America: Cystic Fibrosis [87]
In 1991 Stanley Fiel noted of transplantation, ‘‘There is now a
therapeutic option for end-stage CF that points up how the field
has moved beyond the stark antinomy of heroics versus palliation.’’ In other words, in the past when physicians and patients
faced the end-of-life realities of CF, they typically thought either
in fatalistic terms (hospice) or in heroic terms (last-ditch interventions). But transplantation, he insisted, was a third kind of
option, neither fatalistic nor heroic: damaged lungs were simply
replaced with healthy donor organs in an effort to extend the lives
of CF patients. In 1991, in view of the growing number of transplant cases and the apparent fact ‘‘that the transplanted lungs do
not redevelop CF,’’ Fiel called the use of HLT in cystic fibrosis
‘‘an example of what now may provisionally be called a therapeutic breakthrough in a chronic disease.’’ Of course, no one claimed
that HLT would alter the ‘‘pervasiveness and progressive course
of the disease.’’ Fiel and many other authors, though optimistic,
typically framed their evaluations as ‘‘provisional,’’ based on ‘‘apparent’’ and ‘‘potential’’ facts—and rightly so, since the cases
were few in number and the long-term implications remained unclear.80 Though transplant surgeons might hope that the biology
of the disease could be significantly altered by lung transplantation, they acknowledged that mortality depended upon a variety
of extrapulmonary factors, among them nutrition, pancreatic disorder, and infection.
Professional and popular writers invested enormous hope in
this daring technique even as they acknowledged its limitations.
An article in Time magazine noted, ‘‘Experts on cystic fibrosis agree
. . . that such surgical wonders are of limited use . . . for transplantation was not appropriate for all CF patients, since many
suffer from diabetes, kidney failure and other complications that
make them ineligible for transplants.’’ In fact, in the best circumstances transplantation could serve only a small percentage of CF
patients, since ‘‘a shortage of lung donors poses an even greater
problem.’’ 81 Some public media focused on the ‘‘life-giving’’ possibilities of lung transplantation.82 But most popular articles in
[88] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
the late 1980s and early 1990s conceded that lung transplants in
cystic fibrosis were a ‘‘last resort,’’ a dramatic, risky gambit at the
end stage of the disease. People magazine reported, ‘‘Complications of the transplant itself—rejection of the lungs, or infection
—can be fatal.’’ 83
If lung transplantation represented a major crossroads in CF
care in the 1980s and 1990s, it was still a complex problem that
revealed the administrative, sociological, and economic difficulties of bringing high-tech medicine within reach of all Americans. It was an option primarily for those with insurance coverage, or those with the money to pay out of pocket. It was also a
socially complex enterprise relying on donor networks to make
scarce organs available. Transplantation meant long wait times
and highlighted the connectedness of patients via the vast organsharing network. And it involved continuous medical care after
the operation in order to combat organ rejection, care that entailed significant health risks of its own. In short, transplantation, like comprehensive care, required resources—even more resources, in fact. Transplantation also involved complex processes
with major impediments to success, and it meant lifelong posttransplant medical care.
Experts insisted that heart-lung transplantation, a particularly
complex, expensive procedure, should not be considered a cure,
regardless of the popular hype. Rather, it was a tradeoff with its
own set of dangers and frustrations. ‘‘I don’t think you can call
organ transplantation a cure,’’ noted surgeon Thomas Spray in
1992, after almost a decade of performing transplant operations
on CF patients. ‘‘It will extend the life of patients,’’ he affirmed,
but the need for regular medical care throughout post-transplant
life meant that patients were simply ‘‘trading one kind of disease
for another. Having a transplant is a chronic illness.’’ 84
There was something else noteworthy about lung transplantation: it was, for the most part, an unregulated and entrepreneurial kind of innovation, and it involved some of the most extensive high-tech teamwork in medicine. As lung transplantation
Risky Business in White America: Cystic Fibrosis [89]
for cystic fibrosis expanded at academic health centers during the
1980s and 1990s, it became part of the unfolding story of for-profit
health care. These surgical centers were largely unfettered by government regulation or sweeping institutional oversight, because
surgical innovation had never fallen under the purview of the Food
and Drug Administration (FDA). Innovation in transplant surgery
was not controlled by the same regulatory procedures that evaluated and controlled the market in drugs, and as such it was surrounded by an air of entrepreneurism.85 Patients, families, and
practitioners worked together to locate donors, to negotiate with
insurers about payment, and to find surgeons capable of carrying out the expensive procedures. One author, voicing a concern
raised by many others, wondered, ‘‘Should resources be devoted
to rather exotic procedures [like HLT] benefiting a few rather than
to more ordinary measures that may help many people?’’ 86 This
was an emerging dilemma throughout the American health care
system in the 1980s and 1990s, a time of intense debate about
the nation’s health priorities, about privilege and injustice, about
the virtues of deregulation, and about the embrace of costly hightechnology medicine over basic care.
Thus, in the 1990s, at the dawn of the age of gene therapy
for cystic fibrosis, experts spoke of both promise and frustration,
and many of them looked anxiously for new breakthroughs that
might finally carry CF patients into the promised land of cure. As
CF researchers and patients looked back on the history of comprehensive care, antibiotics, and lung transplantation, they saw
therapeutic progress, they saw sick children living longer and becoming young adults, and they also saw unexpected side effects
and health setbacks. Patients had in many respects traded one type
of deadly disease for another—one that was manageable, but still
deadly. The appeal of gene therapy in CF must be seen in the light
of these earlier therapeutic and social developments. Physicians
and researchers looked at the aging population of CF patients and
saw frustration with both antibacterial therapy and lung transplantation, and a willingness to take bold risks in the face of
[90] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
death. Patients and their families looked at researchers and saw
an entrepreneurial ethos that championed risk taking and hope;
an increasing focus on the lungs as the critical organ in CF care;
and a research culture that embraced innovation and increasingly
turned practitioners, surgeons, and scientists into salesmen and
entrepreneurs. And all these groups saw a poignant disease that
some white Americans had come to identify as their own.
a daring venture for the risktakers:
gene therapy in the 1990s
In the 1990s, at the very time when questions about lung transplantation and antibiotic medicine for cystic fibrosis were roiling
the profession, gene therapy emerged as a wonderous dream, a
scientific fantasy inspiring intense hope, despite the risks. ‘‘We’re
hoping,’’ said Robert Beall of the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation, ‘‘that
two new drug therapies, plus gene therapy in the near future, will
someday prevent the need for lung transplants.’’ 87 Gene therapy
quickly attracted both public and professional acclaim as a revolutionary innovation for CF and other diseases. The reaction was
extraordinarily optimistic, especially for an experimental procedure that had produced no proven benefits to any patient with
any disease. There was, however, good reason for optimism. The
excitement about gene therapy followed on the heels of the discovery in 1989 of one of the defective genes implicated in CF, a
discovery made possible by extensive investment in mapping the
human genome and identifying disease-causing genes.88 This defective gene apparently resulted in the failure of chloride to pass
through the walls of cells in the CF patient, a failure that led to
mucus accumulation, lung deterioration, and early death. Gene
therapy was hypothetically envisioned as a method of repairing
the chloride transport process by somehow inserting corrective
copies of the newly discovered gene into the tissue in the lungs. In
championing gene therapy for lung repair, its advocates adopted
the prevailing lung-oriented assumptions about the disease. But
Risky Business in White America: Cystic Fibrosis [91]
Cystic Fibrosis
‘‘the most common fatal inherited
disease among caucasians’’
Understanding of CF has evolved rapidly in the last four decades,
thanks to novel scientific ideas, therapeutic innovations, and CF’s
increasing cultural significance in America.
Carrier Frequency
Disease Incidence
Life Expectancy
Inheritance
Cause
Mechanism
Symptoms
Diagnosis
1 in 25–30 Caucasians and Ashkenazic Jews
1 in 2,500–4,500 Caucasians
Mid-thirties (median); over 40 percent of U.S.
patients are adults
Autosomal recessive
Gene mutation on chromosome 7; over 1,000
CF mutations identified
By current accounts, CF begins as a defective
gene known as the CF transmembrane
conductance regulator (CFTR), which
allows the body to produce thick, sticky
mucous secretions that affect various
organ systems. Most seriously, the mucus
clogs the lungs, leading to life-threatening
lung infections, or it obstructs the
pancreas and prevents proper food
absorption and digestion.
The symptoms of CF vary widely from one
patient to another, and include saltytasting skin; thick sputum; persistent
coughing; wheezing or shortness of
breath; chronic lung infections; weight
loss; greasy, bulky stools; nasal polyps;
and sterility among males. Long-term
complications include lung failure, stress
on cardiovascular system, and diabetes.
There are many methods for diagnosing CF,
from a simple sweat test to more
Treatments
Prevention
complicated tests that can identify specific
gene mutations. A high concentration of
salt in the patient’s sweat indicates CF.
CF is manageable, but treatments are as
diverse as the disease itself and have been
central to transforming the CF experience
over the last several decades. These
include clearing mucus from the lungs,
chest physical therapy (including vigorous
back clapping), aerosolized antibiotics
used to treat lung infections, mucusthinning drugs, antibiotics for chronic
infections, and pancreatic enzymes and
strict diets for digestive and nutritional
issues. Lung transplantation is available
for patients with lung failure.
Prenatal testing for fetuses is possible using
amniocentesis or chorionic villi sampling
to identify the CF gene. Carrier testing is
available for adults.
Since its discovery in the late-1930s, CF has been transformed
from a fatal childhood disease into a chronic but manageable
disease. Screening programs have curbed the incidence of the
disease.* It is estimated, however, that over ten million Americans
carry the CF gene.
* Jeanette E. Dankert-Roelse and Gerard J. Te Meerman, ‘‘Screening
for Cystic Fibrosis: Time to Change Our Position?’’ New England
Journal of Medicine 337 (2 October 1997): 997–99.
Cystic Fibrosis and Gene Therapy
Enthusiasm for gene therapy in CF patients ran high in the 1990s,
even though it was clear that gene therapy would not relieve all the
symptoms of the disease. But the grand hope of a cure began to
falter in the late 1990s, when gene therapy experiments produced
severe side effects in subjects. And the venture suffered a devastating
setback when Jesse Gelsinger—a young man with another disorder,
OTC (ornithine transcarbamoylase) deficiency—died during a gene
therapy experiment.
‘‘I don’t think chloride regulation is the sole defect, and I’m not sure
it’s the primary pathology, . . . [there is more to CF] than a failure
to clear lung mucus.’’
—Richard Boucher, CF researcher, 1990
‘‘Twenty years from now, gene therapy will have revolutionized the
practice of medicine. Virtually every disease will have gene therapy
as one of its treatments.’’
—W. French Anderson, gene therapy pioneer, 1996
‘‘The new CF research shows that the [gene therapy] strategy works
for an ever-increasing list of disorders where a defective gene is responsible . . . It gives credence to the idea that gene therapy will find
a significant place in the therapeutic armamentarium.’’
—Francis Collins, director of the National Human Genome
Research Institute and co-discoverer of the CF gene, 1990
‘‘To think we’re going to cure cystic fibrosis in a year is naïve, I’m
not discouraged but this is going to take time and people shouldn’t
have unrealistic expectations.’’
—Ron Crystal, CF researcher, 1993
‘‘They were going to inform me of everything they discovered . . .
They were going to make me part of their team . . . [But they] were
blinded by all the money, the prestige that was going to be attained by
getting this to work, and willing to take risks with innocent people
who didn’t have the knowledge they need to know to be able to participate properly in this.’’
—Paul Gelsinger, father of Jesse Gelsinger, 2002
the enthusiasm for gene therapy shared much with the high expectations for heart-lung transplantation and other interventions.
It represented dramatic new hope. But most important, the rise of
gene therapy reflected a new kind of entrepreneurism. Over time,
the gene therapy phenomenon reflected the growing influence of
financial speculation and venture capital in clinical research.
As early as November 1985, the business media was reporting favorably on the financial promise of gene therapy targeted
at particular populations. Noting that the age of ‘‘gene doctors’’
seemed to be upon us, Business Week magazine ran a cover story
on the emergence of these physicians of the future—a group on
the verge of ‘‘erasing nature’s mistakes’’ and ‘‘curing life’s cruelest diseases.’’ 89 And when the New York Times headlines in October 1995 announced, ‘‘Genetic Marker for Cystic Fibrosis Reported
Found,’’ a prominent section heading—‘‘Disease of Caucasians’’
—pointed to the expected beneficiaries, indicating that the population of those affected could be vast and yet also circumscribed
by race.90 Like lung transplantation, gene therapy emerged in the
1980s as a promising cottage research industry. But unlike HLT,
which was developed in academic surgical units, the prospects for
gene therapy would depend on larger sources of financing. From
a very early date, gene therapy was also presented to the public
as the object of a race among scientists and industry, the aim of
that race being new kinds of treatments that ‘‘won’t reach hospitals for years.’’ But, it was claimed, this was an international race
in which ‘‘the first experiments on humans are near.’’ 91 These unabashedly speculative reports highlighted the enormous funding
needs and capital potential of such experiments. Yet by 1990 the
so-called gene doctors had actually achieved little beyond identifying CF genes.
From the beginning of the gene therapy enterprise, researchers promised exciting breakthroughs for patients with inherited
disorders like cystic fibrosis, sickle cell disease, and hemophilia.
But scientists would have to devise and test truly novel methods
for introducing foreign genetic material into the body, preventing
Risky Business in White America: Cystic Fibrosis [95]
its rejection, and ensuring its safe functioning. Gene therapy gave
rise to new kinds of research trials, for transferring genetic material was not quite the same as testing a new drug. In the 1970s
and early 1980s, public and professional discussions usually fixated on a new drug only after it had passed through clinical trials
and won approval for use. Nor was it equivalent to testing a new
surgical procedure, even though gene therapy styled itself as more
akin to surgical innovation (indeed, an early metaphor was ‘‘gene
surgery’’). There was no clear parallel between gene therapy and
other modes of therapeutic innovation. In gene therapy, clinical
research operated in this gray zone between drug testing and surgical innovation—and this, in part, gave the enterprise its revolutionary aura.92 Even as they organized their experiments, researchers were also forming start-up companies, raising funds for
these innovative therapies and seeking a market for them. The new
gene doctors, then, blurred the distinctions between scientist and
salesman, surgical pioneer and drug innovator, playing a role not
just in developing new drugs and techniques but in testing them
and in promoting them as well.
If the technique existed in an uncharted gray zone, so too did
the researchers who mixed scientific investigation with the pursuit of profit. The new gene doctors were simultaneously researchers and entrepreneurs, conducting their clinical trials with profits
in mind, acquiring stock in the enterprises they developed, or
taking shares in the companies whose products their studies were
evaluating. News articles relentlessly documented their efforts to
correct the genetic abnormality, never allowing readers to lose
sight of the fact that CF was ‘‘the most common lethal disease
among white people, striking an estimated 30,000 Americans.’’ 93
Such references to race and to the large potential population of CF
patients conveyed to investors the scope of the problem and the
symbolic import of the gene therapy venture. Building on these
images, the gene doctors stoked ever-higher public expectations.
Enthusiasm for a gene-therapy cure for cystic fibrosis peaked in
the early 1990s, when testing of a new gene delivery technique ap[96] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
peared imminent.94 In 1993 the pulmonary specialist Ronald Crystal began the first experiment at the National Heart, Lung, and
Blood Institute, using an adenovirus (a cold virus) as a vector to
deliver genetic material to the lungs of a person with CF, ‘‘fulfilling hopes that had gathered locomotive force in the past several
months,’’ according to the New York Times. The study (one of three
approved experiments) involved a twenty-three-year-old man with
CF who, in the words of the newspaper, inhaled a cold virus that
had been altered to ‘‘enclose a healthy copy of the cystic fibrosis
gene the patient lacked.’’ According to the theory, the gene in the
virus, if taken up into the DNA of the lung tissue and expressed
there, could possibly alter the impaired chloride transport in the
lung cells of the patient. Although the article described the subject
as a ‘‘patient’’ and was replete with references to ‘‘breakthroughs,’’
‘‘firsts,’’ and ‘‘milestones,’’ in reality the study intended to test
not a treatment but rather a narrow yet crucial component of the
theory: the efficacy of the gene transfer process. Amid the grandiose verbiage about ‘‘breakthroughs,’’ this article acknowledged
that ‘‘the man . . . is not likely to benefit clinically from the initial treatment, but will help scientists determine if the method
has a chance of working and how long its effects last.’’ 95 It was
not uncommon for news media to create the mistaken impression
that clinical studies to test the narrow problem of gene expression were a form of treatment. Newsweek, for example, casually announced that researchers were ‘‘learning to replace a faulty gene’’
and that Crystal planned to ‘‘treat’’ nine other adults with adenovirus, using gradually increasing doses.96
At the start of Crystal’s experiments, researchers themselves
spoke of gene therapy as an impending cure, although some remained cautious about the true implications for patients.97 As
physician Bonnie Ramsey stated with certainty and in typically
grandiose terms, ‘‘In the next decade, we are going to see a revolution in treatment for this disease. We can really, truly think about
a cure.’’ Yet some parents, those who had learned firsthand about
the pros and cons of antibiotics and lung transplants, were more
Risky Business in White America: Cystic Fibrosis [97]
cautiously optimistic. As one pointed out, ‘‘We’re fully aware that
whatever they come up with may not be in time for our daughter.’’
The realities of lung deterioration also raised questions about the
precise benefits gene therapy could and could not deliver. Could it,
for example, repair already damaged lung tissue? Not likely. Would
it be as useful in older CF patients as in younger ones? Probably
not, noted one observer, since ‘‘most patients past puberty have
already suffered too much lung damage to be saved by even the
most sophisticated therapies.’’ 98
As gene therapy emerged into the trial phase, the race to serve
this growing cohort of patients and to relieve their pain was moving forward rapidly, partly because the economic opportunities
were so great. Biotechnology firms had already invested large
sums in the hunt for novel CF drugs. In March 1993 Genentech,
Inc., requested permission from the FDA to market a cystic fibrosis drug called DNase that had been shown in clinical trials to reduce respiratory infections and improve breathing. Business Week
proclaimed, ‘‘A star drug is born.’’ 99 Another article commented
that ‘‘Genentech’s stock rose 50 cents a share’’ after the announcement.100 A third pointed out that DNase, marketed under the
brand name Pulmozyme, was only one player in a ‘‘$600 million
dollar horse race’’ in which many companies, from small startups to biotechnology giants, were trying ‘‘to capture the potentially lucrative gene therapy market.’’ Leading the pack was Ron
Crystal, identified as ‘‘co-founder of gene therapy start-up GenVec in Rockville, Maryland,’’ with $17 million of capital support
from Genentech and facilities presumably in close proximity to
his offices at the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute.101
In late 1993 Crystal’s venture, and along with it gene therapy’s prospects, hit a serious snag when his third ‘‘patient’’ developed a number of troubling symptoms: lung inflammation, a drop
in oxygen levels in the blood, and evidence of pulmonary damage. These events exposed the enormous differences between, on
one hand, large-scale clinical trials, with large numbers of subjects, drugs well-vetted for safety, and researchers ‘‘blinded’’ so
[98] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
that their biases would not shape the results, and, on the other
hand, studies like Crystal’s involving a handful of individuals, unproven agents and procedures, and researchers fully conscious of
the financial import of their findings. When the troubling symptoms arose, Crystal rushed to defend his venture, speculating
that this ‘‘patient’’ may have been ‘‘idiosyncratic.’’ At the same
time he acknowledged that these events could plausibly suggest
that the ‘‘upper limits’’ of adenovirus therapy had been reached.
Crystal backed away from broad claims of curing CF, and the
reporter remarked that the incident underscored ‘‘the difficulties of turning a highly experimental therapy into a workaday
clinical method.’’ The setback prompted a renewed focus on the
hypothesis-testing features of what were now termed early-stage
trials, ‘‘simply designed to explore questions of safety, to determine whether the gene switches on once the adenovirus has infected lung cells and to learn how long the effect lasts.’’ 102 Signs
that adenovirsues caused lower oxygen levels, inflammation, and
possibly lung damage as well as other side effects ultimately forced
Crystal and several other scientists to revise the expectations of
the early 1990s and to stress the experimental character of their
gene therapy research. Some advocates even suggested that the
wisdom of the adenovirus approach itself needed to be reevaluated.
Unmitigated optimism gave way to cautious hope as the gene
therapy enterprise came more clearly into focus as ‘‘experimental.’’ Extensive discussions of gene therapy’s limitations would
follow. ‘‘Despite their enthusiasm,’’ noted one survey in a 1994
issue of Discover, ‘‘researchers know there are potential drawbacks.’’ 103 Another 1995 survey of the field in Science commented,
‘‘Right from the start, gene therapists have recognized that their
central challenge would be to find safe vectors capable of transporting genes efficiently into target cells—and getting the cells to
express the genes once they are inserted.’’ 104 Notably, observers
also began to acknowledge that the procedure (even if successful)
was unlikely to be a one-time fix; rather, the method would probRisky Business in White America: Cystic Fibrosis [99]
ably involve frequent treatments, since ‘‘lung epithelial cells are
shed about every two or three months . . . [and] the new genes’
efficacy seems to last only a few weeks.’’ 105 Such speculation was
premature in 1994, for everyone now acknowledged that key problems of safety and efficacy remained. One problem, which had
severe implications for gene therapy’s efficacy, was the inflammation caused by the immune system’s response to the adenovirus. Simply stated, the virus looked ‘‘like a foreign invader to
the immune system, so after repeated exposures, a patient’s immune system could learn to drive off the virus before it delivers
its load.’’ 106 Another limitation, according to researcher Richard
Boucher, was that gene therapy researchers were caught in a dilemma about dosage. ‘‘When administered at low concentrations
[the adenovirus] is ineffective . . . at high doses, however, it appears to cause acute inflammation.’’ 107 To be sure, optimism continued, but it was a more cautious ‘‘experimental’’ optimism. Promoters of the gene therapy enterprise continued to believe that
CF was the ideal target disease to prove the worth of the adenovirus approach to gene therapy; it was, as one source noted, ‘‘just
the opponent gene therapy has been looking for.’’ Optimism remained a crucial force in sustaining the flow of venture capital for
the research enterprise, and entrepreneurs continued to see the
disease as an opportunity for demonstrating the promise of their
agenda.108
To be sure, there was money to be made in day-to-day cystic
fibrosis care, but gene therapy seemed to be a far more lucrative prospect because of the large, relatively privileged market of
patients and the frustrations of patients, families, and doctors
with the therapeutic status quo. Science magazine’s 1995 survey
provided an overview of the ‘‘hundreds of millions of dollars at
stake.’’ Many businesses pressed forward in the race for gene therapy, even as researchers now made more cautious claims. As the
Science article put it, ‘‘Academic researchers are still grappling with
fundamental issues in gene therapy. But industry leaders and their
financial agents are gung-ho.’’ 109 Such tensions were, of course,
[100] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
not confined to gene therapy and CF, for throughout the 1980s
and 1990s the close ties between private enterprise and university research stirred debate about the influence of money on objectivity and the ethics of these research arrangements.110 James
Wilson, director of the Institute for Gene Therapy at the University of Pennsylvania and one of gene therapy’s early proponents,
acknowledged that ‘‘commercial pressure may . . . account for
some of the hype surrounding developments in gene therapy . . .
If you’re the leader of a gene-therapy company, you try to put as
positive a spin as you can on every step of the research process . . .
because you have to create promise out of what you have—that’s
your value.’’ 111
Frank assessments like this one made clear that researchers
like Ron Crystal were a troubling modern hybrid: the researcher/
entrepreneur. The company Crystal had co-founded, GenVec, Inc.,
with $20 million in capital, was one of fourteen companies that
had invested hundreds of millions of dollars in the grand venture.112 In the minds of many cystic fibrosis researchers, such ventures were not a problem but a solution. Many patients, family
members, and policy makers agreed. When the U.S. Senate Committee on Small Business held hearings in 1994 on ‘‘research on
childhood diseases by entrepreneurs,’’ speakers testified that
‘‘gene therapy holds the promise of a cure for CF.’’ 113 In their view,
gene therapy was destined to ‘‘transform medicine.’’ 114 But where
some saw promise, breakthrough, and profit, others perceived an
increasingly troubled enterprise. At the heart of the problem was
a potentially dangerous vehicle (the adenovirus) and an increasingly problematic relationship among clinician-researchers, CF
patients and their families, entrepreneurial venture capital, and
the biotechnology market.
Cystic fibrosis gene therapy was not going as planned, and the
real prospect emerged that the disease and the technique might
not be made for one another after all. By the mid-1990s, some researchers had begun to discuss explicitly how faith in gene therapy
had perpetuated a narrow view of CF as a lung disease, thereby obRisky Business in White America: Cystic Fibrosis [101]
scuring the complex biological character of the disease and enormous variations in how individual patients experienced the disease.115 Richard Boucher acknowledged as early as 1990, ‘‘I don’t
think chloride regulation is the sole defect, and I’m not sure it’s
the primary pathology,’’ suggesting that there was more to CF
‘‘than a failure to clear lung mucus.’’ 116 The promise of gene therapy continued to captivate the business world and reporters, one
of whom called it ‘‘bottling the stuff of dreams.’’ 117 But researchers and biotech companies increasingly acknowledged the problems with the adenovirus model and with gene therapy’s focus
on cystic fibrosis. Following a series of disappointing setbacks,
Crystal commented in 1998 that whereas CF required regular expression from the introduced gene, by contrast ‘‘for certain cancers and cardiovascular disease, you don’t need expression forever.’’ Accordingly, the company he founded, GenVec, was now
‘‘concentrating on gene therapy for cardiovascular disease.’’ Similarly, after eight unsuccessful gene therapy trials for CF, the chief
scientific officer at Genzyme Corporation announced, ‘‘Maybe the
quickest route to solving cystic fibrosis is to take a detour.’’ 118 The
vast enterprise had apparently moved on, to make promises (and
overpromises) to other patients, families, and disease constituencies. The gene therapy train was headed off in new, more promising and potentially profitable directions, leaving CF patients at
the station.119
Viewed in retrospect, the enthusiasm surrounding gene therapy for cystic fibrosis was close kin with the dot-com bubble of the
1990s.120 Mirroring the wave of heavy investment in computer and
Internet-related companies, venture capital investment in gene
therapy poured vast sums into companies seeking breakthrough
therapies for potentially lucrative markets of patients. Pharmaceutical companies threw their support behind pioneering research scientists at the helm of smaller start-up ventures. In those
heady days many clinical research entrepreneurs became speculators and made large personal investments in this part of the
biotech boom—rewriting old rules about objectivity and research
[102] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
ethics. For many, gene therapy was the holy grail of biomedical
research. Gene therapy offered to bring the CF patient something
fundamentally different from antibacterial therapy, comprehensive management, or lung transplantation: gene therapy promised
cure. Yet this promise was a product of the broader speculative
fervor surrounding the technology-based stock market, and every
observer knew that it far exceeded any demonstrated efficacy. Yet
almost all of the main players also believed that this was a secure
investment in the future of both medicine and cystic fibrosis care.
investment in bad dreams:
the death of jesse gelsinger
How did the dream of genetic medicine and efforts to bring genetic therapies to the medical marketplace exploit ideas of identity, partnership, risk taking, and breakthrough medicine? By the
late 1990s the gene therapy campaign had moved away from cystic fibrosis to other research terrain, to other diseases—some of
them more obscure than CF and others better known. In the wake
of problems with gene therapy for cystic fibrosis, the University of
Pennsylvania researchers led by James Wilson had abandoned CF
as their model disease, deciding instead to take up a new disorder
called ornithine transcarbamoylase deficiency and to use another
modified adenovirus. This time they hoped for smoother sailing
toward a cure. But the ensuing controversy would reveal even more
about the enterprise. In 1999 the dream of an easy cure suffered
another stunning setback: the sudden death of an eighteen-yearold man named Jesse Gelsinger who was participating in a gene
therapy experiment at Penn. The Gelsinger case quickly turned the
spotlight away from the ‘‘promising miracle’’ of genetic transformation and focused it on the industry itself—on how it sold its
claims and how such an industry should be regulated.
Although the Gelsinger case does not concern cystic fibrosis
per se, it focused the microscope on the scientists themselves and
drew public attention to how boosters of gene therapy sold exalted
Risky Business in White America: Cystic Fibrosis [103]
promises of genetic transformation to patients, their families, and
the public, and how the hype played upon people’s broader faith
in risk taking and in the power of the marketplace to improve their
lives. A close look at the case allows us to draw some final conclusions about the selling of the dream of genetic transformation, to
scrutinize those who bought into the dream, and to explore the
powerful and widely shared assumptions about the marketplace
that sustained the appeal of this dream for many mainstream
Americans—if only for a limited time.
On 17 September 1999, eighteen-year-old Jesse Gelsinger died
after developing complications resulting from his participation in
a gene transfer experiment at the University of Pennsylvania. Although the cause of his death would be disputed for some time to
come, first indications suggested that his body had experienced
an acute immune response to the adenovirus that researchers were
using to try to transfer a healthy, functioning gene into Jesse’s impaired liver. Jesse had been a lifelong sufferer of the rare disorder
ornithine transcarbamoylase (OTC) deficiency, a metabolic disease that impaired his liver’s ability to rid itself of ammonia.121 His
death had immediate implications for both gene therapy research
and cystic fibrosis research, for it suggested that some of the very
features that had made CF and OTC appealing test cases for gene
therapy also made patients vulnerable as research subjects. As New
York Times journalist Sheryl Gay Stolberg put it, ‘‘Every realm of
medicine has its defining moment, often with a face attached.
Polio had Jonas Salk. In vitro fertilization had Louise Brown, the
world’s first test tube baby. Transplant surgery had Barney Clark,
the Seattle dentist with the artificial heart. AIDS had Magic Johnson. And now gene therapy has Jesse Gelsinger.’’ 122
Like many of the cystic fibrosis patients who embraced gene
therapy in the 1990s, Jesse Gelsinger was willing to take risks.
He was at a crossroads with regard to his disease and his life. He
had been lucky enough to survive infancy and childhood with his
disorder and to arrive at a point where he could make critical decisions for himself about the course of his therapy. Immediately
[104] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
after his eighteenth birthday—indeed, on the very day he ceased to
be a minor—Jesse flew to Philadelphia from his home in Tucson,
Arizona, to begin experimental gene therapy with a team of researchers led by James Wilson. Only recently had the Penn researchers turned away from CF gene therapy experiments, hoping
that OTC would prove to be a more malleable target disease. The
Penn research team had devised a protocol for testing an adenovirus that had been modified to carry a functional OTC gene into
the impaired livers of nineteen patients, Jesse among them. Like
CF researcher Ron Crystal a few years earlier, the Penn researchers believed that their modified adenovirus would safely express
detectable levels of OTC in human patients deficient in the enzyme. Classified by the FDA as a phase I clinical trial, the experiment was designed to test the safety of the technique, including
levels of toxicity, and promised no therapeutic benefit to Jesse or
the other OTC-deficient patients participating in the experiment.
A crucial lesson had been learned from the CF studies of previous years: Wilson’s team did not appear to glorify or oversell the
therapeutic possibilities.
Jesse, the youngest patient in the trial, was chosen to receive the
highest dose of adenovirus, which, researchers explained, would
likely produce flulike symptoms. Penn researchers made it clear
to Jesse and his father, Paul—both of whom signed informedconsent forms—that any improvements in his condition that
might possibly stem from the experiment would not last and that
the experiment entailed several kinds of risk. A day of surgery was
necessary to administer the virus; the expected flulike symptoms
would warrant an overnight stay in the hospital; and there were
risks posed by the liver biopsy that would be required to ascertain if Jesse’s liver was expressing OTC by way of the genetically
modified virus. The researchers also mentioned risks of bleeding,
blood clots, hepatitis, liver failure, and other postsurgical complications.123 Paul Gelsinger chose not to make the trip to Philadelphia with his son because, as he understood it, the most dangerous part of the procedure was the liver biopsy that would follow
Risky Business in White America: Cystic Fibrosis [105]
the injection of the adenovirus by a few days. Asked later about the
adenovirus, Paul recalled believing that ‘‘there was no great risk
there, that [the Penn researchers] hadn’t seen any really bad side
effects, that there was just flu-like symptoms . . . The way they
described it, this thing looked so safe. Jesse was going to get the
flu.’’ 124
By the late 1990s, of course, researchers knew well that the
body’s response to the gene therapy vector—inflammation, fever,
and ‘‘the flu’’—constituted a significant challenge to patients, but
few were prepared for what the vector appeared to provoke in
Jesse Gelsinger’s body. The word flu conveyed the concern in terms
that families could understand, but as the Gelsingers would soon
learn, it did not accurately describe the body’s physiological response. While no one could immediately ascertain what caused
Jesse’s death, his health deteriorated rapidly on 13 September in
the hours following the injection of the adenovirus. A severe immune response led to what the Penn doctors initially described
as ‘‘multiple organ failure.’’ 125 Jesse’s ammonia levels became
dangerously elevated. By the next morning, other symptoms suggested that his red blood cells were breaking down faster than his
liver could metabolize them.126 As ammonia levels in Jesse’s blood
rose, coma, lung failure, and brain death followed. After four days
and a series of desperate efforts to combat these catastrophic
symptoms, the doctors finally advised the Gelsinger family to remove Jesse from life support. The trial was immediately halted.127
Over the following year, Paul Gelsinger’s relationship with the
Penn researcher gradually deteriorated, and the unfolding story
became a lens through which the entire gene therapy enterprise,
with its hype and inflated promises, was scrutinized. As the Penn
researchers set out to investigate the events leading to Jesse’s
death, they shared news of their findings with the distraught father every step of the way. Initially he harbored no enmity toward
the researchers, and he defended Jesse’s doctors, telling reporters, ‘‘They are good people. Their intent was pure.’’ 128
By September 2000, however, Paul Gelsinger’s view of the
[106] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
events had changed as he learned more about the financial interests of the researchers. A year after his son’s death, Paul concluded that the Penn research team had fraudulently and negligently recruited Jesse into their clinical trials, and he filed a suit
against James Wilson and three other doctors on the team.129 After
a tumultuous year spent participating in investigations into Jesse’s
death and into the claims of the gene therapy industry, Paul Gelsinger stated, ‘‘They were going to inform me of everything they
discovered . . . They were going to make me part of their team
. . . [But they] were blinded by all the money, the prestige that was
going to be attained by getting this to work, and willing to take
risks with innocent people who didn’t have the knowledge they
need to know to be able to participate properly in this.’’ 130 Jesse’s
family—along with major regulators, peer institutions, and other
scientists—concluded that the ‘‘partnership’’ between Jesse and
his doctors had been little more than an elaborate fiction. The
FDA had taken the lead in investigating whether the Penn researchers had hoodwinked the agency and other regulatory bodies
into approving the experiments by not disclosing the true risks
involved.131 After its own reassessment, the FDA chastised Wilson and his colleagues for playing down previously noted warning
signs; for example, they had failed to report serious side effects
in two of the subjects who had been successfully ‘‘treated’’ before
Gelsinger.
What most outraged FDA investigators, Paul Gelsinger, and
others was the specter of the profit motive skewing scientific judgment.132 This topic had been a source of concern to some critics
for years. But the Gelsinger investigation put a human face to this
story of money and science, thus transforming the moral terrain
around gene therapy. The FDA’s investigation revealed that James
Wilson had founded a company that held the rights to any successful treatments using the adenovirus, and investigators found
this to be a significant conflict of interest that clouded Wilson’s
assessment of risks and benefits. In these and many other ways,
the FDA argued, the integrity of the research process had been
Risky Business in White America: Cystic Fibrosis [107]
compromised. Not surprisingly, the investigators also found that
material posted on the Penn website to recruit volunteer subjects contained misleadingly optimistic language about the benefits potentially stemming from the experiment.133 The Gelsinger
scandal damaged the careers of some of the most prominent gene
therapy entrepreneurs of the 1990s, including James Wilson (who
nevertheless earned $13.5 million when his company was sold to
Targeted Genetics Corp. of Seattle in 2000).134 From this point
forward, the claims of those conducting experimental gene therapy were subjected to greater scrutiny. Clinical trials halted under
a heavy cloud of suspicion.135
Some Americans felt betrayed. Like Paul Gelsinger, they had
developed a strong sense of trust that gene therapy research was
a true partnership between scientist and subject. But both they
and Gelsinger began to learn of the Penn team’s errors and tactical omissions from a series of public meetings held at the NIH
in December 1999. To be sure, the gene therapists had many defenders at these hearings. When James Wilson and the Penn researchers denied the allegations of impropriety, supporters rallied
to their side.136 Parents of critically ill children, for example, testified about the critical need to continue gene therapy research
despite the tragedy of Jesse’s death. For them, the possibilities
of a dramatic cure through gene therapy still lingered in the air.
However, several researchers admitted their failure to disclose adverse side effects and other events to the FDA and NIH, and they
offered heartfelt apologies.137 At first, Paul Gelsinger supported of
the Penn researchers. But as he listened to their blunt admissions
that there was ‘‘no significant statistical data’’ showing benefit to
patients exposed to adenovirus, he became convinced, as he put
it later, that ‘‘I had been misled.’’ 138 And as in the case of Ronald
Crystal and cystic fibrosis gene therapy, retrospective investigations disclosed the existence of previously unreported deaths—
deaths that at the time were attributed to the patients’ underlying
disease but could now be seen as linked to the effects of gene therapy itself.139 The popular media now knew that Jesse Gelsinger
[108] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
was not the sole casualty of the genetics revolution, and exposés
on ‘‘death at the hands of science’’ undermined faith in the partnership between researchers and their subjects.140
The Gelsinger case allowed observers to see clearly the inner
workings of the culture of hype and promise that shaped the
dream of gene therapy for cystic fibrosis in the 1980s and 1990s.
Investigations afterward also made clear that the deregulatory impulse of the era was a major, if invisible, actor in the drama.
Reagan- and Bush-era zeal for private enterprise and deregulation
had shifted the balance between the public and private sectors,
systematically undermining the government’s regulatory role in
many arenas. The trend continued under the Clinton administration. In a New York Times article reassessing the Gelsinger case,
Sheryl Gay Stolberg linked the episode to the history of a littleknown regulatory body, the Recombinant DNA Advisory Committee (RAC), and explained how its loss of regulatory authority over
the gene therapy enterprise in 1995 precipitated the tragedy.141
Two powerful forces were driving the deregulatory impulse and
nurturing Americans’ cultural investments in the dream of gene
therapy. The first was the biotechnology and pharmaceutical industry itself, which was intent on reducing barriers to the approval
and marketing of new products; the industry had little tolerance
for those who held back innovation out of concern for protecting
vulnerable patients.142 The second force was the patient advocacy
movement—groups of patient activists desperate for faster access
to experimental drugs. A case in point would be the AIDS activists
of the 1980s who successfully pressured the FDA to ‘‘fast-track’’
its approval process.143 Of particular concern for gene therapy researchers was the perception that RAC oversight of gene therapy
trials was unnecessarily duplicative. In the end, the risk-taking
patients and the innovators found common cause in the ideology
of gene therapy, and regulators stood back and waited for events
to unfold. Behind the gene therapy revolution lay a political revolution.144
The enormous optimism surrounding gene therapy in the
Risky Business in White America: Cystic Fibrosis [109]
1990s was deeply ideological, entangled with American political,
business, and mainstream cultural values. Despite the warnings
heard in the 1980s about the mingling of business and scientific interests, the exploitation of research subjects, and the risks
(known and unknown) of genetic experimentation, the genetics
revolution would not wait. The champions of gene therapy dismissed the objections as nay-saying and negativism in the face
of the can-do spirit. Advocates claimed that success would ultimately allay all these concerns. Research subjects were neither
guinea pigs nor a means toward business profit but true partners
in a grand pursuit, sharing equally in the fruits of discovery. But
with the death of Jesse Gelsinger, such expressions of hope gave
way to accusations about the exploitation of trust and the overselling of a dream. And the once-invisible ideological components of
the dream could now (at least for a short time) be visualized.
‘‘basically, it’s a white disease’’:
cystic fibrosis and myths of race
Cystic fibrosis was surrounded by many myths, many of which
remained invisible and unchallenged, and all of which needed to
be constantly nurtured by advocates. One of them was the myth
of imminent breakthrough, the promise that the peaks of success
would grow ever higher, that imperfect technologies were perfectible, and that dying patients could be made well again. Researchers’ and patients’ faith in this myth and their quick embrace of
gene therapy cannot be separated from their sense that CF care
had indeed reached a frustrating plateau. This idea was so central to the thinking of many doctors, families, and patients that
it could be exploited by anyone who had something better to sell,
something more clear-cut and definitive. The idea of gene therapy
for cystic fibrosis filled an emotional need, but in the end it was
a marketing myth, revealing more about the business culture and
mainstream ideologies of the 1990s than about the actual potential of genetic technology. Moreover, the very logic of gene therapy
[110] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
depended upon a radical oversimplification of a complex, multidimensional disorder.
A powerful history of trust, partnership, and belief in innovative treatments took an unfortunate turn in the gene therapy
chapter of the cystic fibrosis story. During the post–World War II
decades, CF patients had grown into adolescence and young adulthood dependent on antibiotics and in close relationships with
doctors and research scientists (and to some extent with pharmaceutical companies). Cystic fibrosis care in the home had long
been portrayed as an extension of lifesaving comprehensive care
in the hospital, and the partnership between parents and doctors
as the central element in progress toward a cure. The home life of
the child with CF stood in stark contrast to that of the child with
Tay-Sachs disease, doomed from the start to an inevitable decline.
But the very progress that had been achieved in CF had become a
source of frustration. By the 1980s, life expectancy for CF patients
had increased dramatically (from 3–5 years to 30–35 years), and
with this transformation came expectations for better care. Of
course the benefits were not evenly spread; at least one study
found that ‘‘medically indigent patients form a subgroup whose
mortality and morbidity are significantly worse than those of the
population of CF patients as a whole.’’ 145 On the whole, however,
patients’ improving fortunes (tinged as they were with frustration)
made it easy for many of them to trust surgeons in the 1980s who
championed heart-lung transplants, or genetic researchers in the
1990s who made increasingly grand promises about gene therapy.
There was, of course, another myth about cystic fibrosis making the rounds in the 1990s: the notion that all ‘‘white people,’’ all
majority Americans who identified as such, had a stake in CF and
the genetic enterprise. Proponents of genetic research and gene
therapy for cystic fibrosis invoked the idea of CF as a ‘‘Caucasian
disease’’ not to raise dollars but to communicate the broad implications of their work. For example, with the discovery of the DF508
mutation responsible for nearly two-thirds of CF cases, many researchers believed that to trace the prevalence of this mutation
Risky Business in White America: Cystic Fibrosis [111]
around the world was to track European identity itself. But what
they discovered was puzzling, for the pattern of the DF508 mutation did not conform to the popular stereotype of cystic fibrosis
as a disease among white people of Northern European ancestry.
Prevalence varied across Europe, with higher rates reported, for
example, in places like Jordan and Ireland than in most parts of
France and Northern Europe. As writings on the DF508 gene mutation for cystic fibrosis make clear, the myth of the disease’s whiteness needed to be constantly nurtured, refined, and shored up in
light of new research findings suggesting a more complex demographic profile.
In the 1970s, Giulio Barbero and other researchers who drew
attention to cystic fibrosis had stressed its panethnic identity, its
reach across many groups, and its incidence among black as well
as white Americans, in order to encourage a broader cultural investment in the disease; but increasingly in the 1980s, researchers
and the mass media signaled to their readers that CF should be
understood as a white person’s disorder. It was, in the words of
one observer, the ‘‘white version of sickle cell disease,’’ a remark
implying a bid for the same kind of attention being given to other
ethnic maladies like Tay-Sachs and sickle cell disease. ‘‘Basically,
it’s a white disease,’’ pronounced Frank Deford in a 1986 Washington Post interview about his biography of his daughter Alex.146
A few years earlier, another Washington Post article made the link
to whiteness more explicit, noting that an avowedly racist and
antisemitic organization known as the National Socialist White
People’s Party had taken up the disease as one of its causes, raising
‘‘funds to support research in cystic fibrosis and other disease that
[the party’s leader] asserted primarily strike people of Northern
European ancestry.’’ 147
This association of whiteness and cystic fibrosis with the new
capital-intensive gene therapy venture is no coincidence. To highlight the ‘‘whiteness’’ of cystic fibrosis was, in a sense, to attempt
to sell a concept, to suggest that CF gene therapy had a vast market, to rally investors and patient constituencies to the idea. Ge[112] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
netics entrepreneurs had particular markets in mind, in much
the same way that pharmaceutical companies targeted drugs to
particular consumer groups. CF’s ‘‘whiteness’’ projected clearly
who the beneficiaries of gene therapy would be—the majority of
Americans—just as legislative attention to sickle cell disease years
earlier had communicated a vision of how resources would be distributed to African Americans.
The race problem in cystic fibrosis is a complicated one. In
France, where high rates of CF have been found in the northwestern region of Brittany (which some characterize as a ‘‘Celtic’’ region), the ‘‘white’’ or ‘‘European’’ nature of the disease can have
little meaning.148 But in America, whiteness is an extremely flexible and potent concept. Two hundred years ago it was quite specific, denoting people of Anglo-Saxon heritage. It later expanded
to subsume waves of ethnic immigrants once labeled ‘‘colored,’’
from Irish to Jewish to Italians and other Europeans. For these
groups, the idea of ‘‘whiteness’’ has come to signify broader processes of acculturation to an American ideal, the giving up of specific Old World identities in exchange for a more secure place in
American society. It has also come to mean identifying with an
American majority culture and its ideals of capital accumulation,
middle-class values, and (increasingly in the 1980s and 1990s),
faith in the marketplace.
Even if the idea would have meant little in a nation like France,
the link between cystic fibrosis and whiteness seemed compelling in the American mind-set of the 1990s. Most stories about
the disease and the possibilities of gene therapies reinforced that
this disease was a ‘‘white’’ or ‘‘Caucasian’’ concern. A 1994 Washington Post story noted, for example, that ‘‘one in 20 Caucasians
harbors a mutated CFTR gene.’’ 149 It was common to read, as the
Atlanta Journal and Constitution noted in 1998, that CF was ‘‘the most
common fatal inherited disease among Caucasians.’’ 150 It was not
merely a threat to white Americans but a global challenge. As a
New York Times article in 2003 noted, CF was ‘‘the most common
life-shortening genetic disease among Caucasians worldwide.’’ 151
Risky Business in White America: Cystic Fibrosis [113]
Amid the focus on cystic fibrosis as an experience with which
white Americans might identify regardless of their ethnic background, some media did highlight the panethnic profile. A 1995
Minnesota Star Tribune article, for example, made the usual observation that CF was ‘‘one of the most common inherited disorders
of Caucasians,’’ occurring in 1 of every 2,500 live births, but also
noted that CF occurred in 1 of every 17,000 births among African
Americans and was rare among Asians and Native Americans.152
These reports would be received differently in their different
locales—New York City, Atlanta, Minneapolis, Washington, D.C.
—but they all suggested that this story of genetic transformation
was to some extent a story about and for whites. The very notion of
white people was, of course, a convenient amalgam, a powerful symbolic reference group for all Americans, whether they belonged to
that group or not. The term white collapsed a wide range of groups
with diverse heritages—from Irish to Italians, from Jews to Northern and Southern Europeans, from English to Germans and Eastern Europeans—into a single category, encouraging them to identify with one another. White operated in much the same way that
people of color or black did: to create a unified perspective and set of
cultural investments.
If Tay-Sachs disease had been etched into the national psyche
as a Jewish genetic disease and sickle cell disease had been cultivated for twenty years as an index of the black experience, cystic fibrosis was a story about genes, suffering, faith, and genetic
transformation as part of the white experience in America. Indeed,
what made the story particularly American was that the very idea
of its whiteness remained unanalyzed. ‘‘Whiteness’’ signified the
erasure of particular ethnic identities and cultural heritages and
the imparting of a new set of ideas about common values and commitments, common histories, and common suffering. Alongside
this racial ethos ran another one that was also about transformation: faith in the ability of business and medicine to deliver on the
promise of innovation, to make sick people better by way of radi[114] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
cal if risky measures. As we shall see in the next chapter, such ideologies of transformation were not universally embraced. A very
different ethos defined how physicians, scientists, families, and
patients struggled with the dream of genetic medicine in sickle
cell disease.
Risky Business in White America: Cystic Fibrosis [115]
3
A Perilous Lottery for the Black Family
sickle cells, social justice, and the
new therapeutic gamble
Patients with sickle cell disease (SCD) and their
physicians have often responded skeptically to grand claims about
therapeutic breakthroughs. Hugh Chaplin, a specialist in hematology, put it this way: ‘‘These patients are on a roller coaster
ride of unrealistic expectations and heartbreak as one announced
‘breakthrough’ after another has failed to materialize.’’ In a 2003
book dedicated to his longtime patient Lenabell McClelland,
Chaplin asked, ‘‘Is there anyone to blame for this?’’ Were journalists and pharmaceutical companies responsible? Or were medical researchers and patients themselves engaging in ‘‘premature
‘hype’’’? In the end, Chaplin concluded, the roller-coaster ride was
not the fault of any particular group, yet the pattern remained clear
and puzzling. ‘‘The story turns up in a national newspaper or on a
television news broadcast,’’ he said. ‘‘Later it turns out that enthusiasm for this ‘breakthrough’ is not justified and nothing further is
heard about the drug.’’ 1 That an established hematologist voiced
such concerns indicates that the particular sensibilities surrounding sickle cell disease were perhaps radically different from those
surrounding cystic fibrosis (CF) and Tay-Sachs disease (TSD).
For nearly a century, and in varying ways, sickle cell disease
has been characterized in the United States as a ‘‘black disease.’’
As a malady especially prevalent in African-American families, it
has been shadowed by a politics of mistrust. In recent years this
mistrust has often been attributed to the ‘‘legacy of Tuskegee’’
and past histories of racial discrimination in medical care.2 In the
particular history of SCD, however, patients’ experiences with the
health care system and with therapies shaped their expectations
and sensibilities.
Indeed, the race question in sickle cell disease has a complex
history, in which the politics of race has played the critical role
while the biology of race has been an elusive shadow. Scientists
in the 1950s and 1960s saw the disease as an African inheritance,
and they theorized that sickle cell carriers (the heterozygote parents of patients) possessed a beneficial resistance to falciparum malaria, and thus had a survival advantage over other people in the
areas of Africa where malaria was prevalent. Over centuries the
heterozygote advantage grew in these regions, but so too did
the likelihood of two such people having children together and
giving birth to a child with sickle cell disease. Scientists learned,
however, that SCD was only one of a widely distributed number of similar hemoglobin disorders—a close cousin to thalassemia, for example, which was prevalent in the Mediterranean, in
Greece and in Italy, where malaria also figured prominently. Thus
region and malaria appeared to be crucial to the evolution of both
SCD and thalassemia. Yet experts pondering SCD tended to see the
disease as an index of fundamental biological race differences. By
contrast, few would suggest that thalassemia’s prevalence meant
that Italians or Greeks were different biological races. The race
question in SCD in America hinged, by and large, on political
rather than scientific calculations.3
As a disease marked by recurring pain and suffering, SCD also
emerged in the 1960s and 1970s as a powerful symbol of the
African-American experience.4 Into the 1980s and 1990s, and still
today, everything about SCD has carried profound cultural meaning. From the pain, the infections, and the high mortality rates
to the African inheritance and the roller coaster of unfulfilled
therapeutic promises, every aspect of SCD in the United States
speaks to the problem of ‘‘race’’ and the social condition of African Americans.
In the years when gene therapy was rising to prominence,
promising imminent relief for patients with the ‘‘Caucasian’’ disA Perilous Lottery for the Black Family: Sickle Cells [117]
ease cystic fibrosis, and when ‘‘genetic matchmaking’’ was taking center stage in the fight against Tay-Sachs disease in UltraOrthodox Jewish communities, sickle cell patients too faced a
complex set of promises and dilemmas. To read the popular and
professional discussions of these genetic maladies is to see very
different stories unfolding, for different cultural values were at
stake in each community of suffering.5 The diseases were microcosms of very different kinds of ethnic politics. In the case of CF,
years of partnership between researchers and families, as well as
significant resources for comprehensive care, had helped build a
stable and effective system of care as well as a shared belief in the
transformative power of innovative medicine. A culture of risktaking and entrepreneurship animated this partnership. By the
1990s, many believed that ‘‘gene therapy’’ would push progress
to an entirely new level, delivering the long-awaited cure for CF
patients who were living longer and yet remained frustrated by
their day-to-day challenges. In the case of Tay-Sachs disease, the
story was not about faith in imminent cures. Rather, it was about
innovative methods of preventing the birth of Tay-Sachs babies,
about Jewish self-determination, and about the lengths to which a
small minority community might go to safeguard its families and
guard itself against a wide range of genetic diseases that were apparently established in their world.
The story of sickle cell disease from the 1950s into the 1990s, by
contrast, followed a path characterized by incremental progress,
recurring promises of breakthrough cures, and highly publicized
disappointments. In contrast to the cystic fibrosis story, a reliable system of comprehensive care still eluded many sickle cell
patients. Many observers, like Chaplin, had seen enormous advances over the years, yet they also believed that basic services
were needed and that the promise of cure was overly simplistic.
Patients and researchers alike always held out hope for therapeutic progress. But over the decades the exalted faith and hype regarding imminent cures became muted as efforts to cure SCD con[118] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
fronted a series of troublesome social realities, such as access to
basic health care.
The idea of risky high-tech innovations, in this context of deprivation, would spawn controversy. Indeed, by the 1990s innovation in SCD care had come to be seen as a dangerous game—a
tricky act of balancing the promises of dramatic advances and the
perils posed by extraordinary medical experiments against the difficulties of accessing standard medical care. In short, the cultural
meaning of innovation was not the same as in the world of cystic fibrosis. Controversy swirled about the use of urea in the 1970s
and appeared again two decades later in discussions of bone marrow transplantation. Against this historical backdrop, what did
the revolution in genetic medicine promise to sickle cell patients
and their families? What did it mean to pursue high-risk cures?
The roller-coaster ride of sickle cell therapeutics offers an object lesson about the politics of black identity in America. For
some, the story that follows may highlight ironies of being black
in modern America; for others, the story may point to the persistence of sometimes astonishingly racist attitudes in medicine
and elsewhere; and for yet others, the story may evoke how black
identity politics comes into play in every arena of American life,
including the medical arena. A particular ethos surrounded questions of therapeutics in SCD. Whatever the meanings of its therapeutic history, the story of sickle cell disease draws attention to
how the disease and innovative treatments for it intertwine with
particular questions of justice and race in America.
In 1993, while people with cystic fibrosis looked forward to
breakthrough improvements in care with the advent of gene therapy, sickle cell patients and their doctors viewed gene therapy with
a strong sense of ambivalence. In SCD, it was not gene therapy
but another innovation—bone marrow transplantation—that became a focal point of intense debates, taking on the same kind of
cultural importance that gene therapy did in cystic fibrosis. The
prospect of bone marrow transplantation raised similar issues
A Perilous Lottery for the Black Family: Sickle Cells [119]
for the SCD community as gene therapy raised in the CF community. Some saw the experimental method—transplanting new
bone marrow cells into sick patients in order to produce normal
red blood cells—as fulfilling the promise of a permanent cure. Yet
it was also clear that bone marrow transplantation was a perilous
lottery. The risks of the procedure ran very high, including the real
possibility of death—anywhere between 10 and 30 percent mortality during the procedure. In the minds of many experts, these
risks far outweighed the benefits and dictated that few patients or
families should be offered the gamble at such bad odds.
The debate reflected competing perspectives on innovation
within the sickle cell community. In the community of doctors and
patients knowledgeable about SCD, there was a deeply ingrained,
and historically shaped, ambivalence about dramatic claims of
cure. This sensibility was, in a way, part of the cultural ethos of the
disease, and it surfaced repeatedly in the history of SCD therapeutics, playing itself out whenever discussions turned to new therapies. Discussions of SCD therapeutics often became an occasion
for imagining the black family and community and for reflecting on the health care system itself. In the case of SCD, then, as
with the genetic diseases considered in earlier chapters, questions
about therapeutics could never be easily separated from specific
cultural debates about the people afflicted.
Although the story of sickle cell disease and bone marrow
transplantation bears some resemblance to the history of cystic
fibrosis and gene therapy, it also resembles the narrative of TaySachs disease and the Dor Yeshorim in that experts, lay people,
white Americans, and African Americans all had well-established
ideas about black identity in relation to the disease. Unlike UltraOrthodox Jews who embraced genetic screening and counseling as
a means of eradicating TSD, many African Americans were skeptical about genetic screening and counseling for SCD. For some
of them, screening and prevention seemed to be part of a long
history—beginning with slavery—of coercive reproductive practices and violations of their rights of self-determination by the
[120] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
white majority. In the early 1970s, many African Americans responded with suspicion to carrier testing for sickle cell disease.
Revelations about the decades-long Tuskegee study of untreated
syphilis in black men in Alabama merely accentuated these suspicions. In SCD’s history, therefore, problems of historical experience, ethnic control, black identity, and the pursuit of social justice eclipsed arguments for breakthrough therapies.6
Such cultural factors as these help to explain why, in the 1990s,
many researchers, patients, and doctors concerned with sickle cell
disease felt a certain ambivalence about gene therapy and other
innovations, even though gene therapy researchers and journalists frequently pointed to SCD as a likely beneficiary of the genetics revolution. In 1993, in the wake of a gene therapy trial on an
infant with a severe immune deficiency disorder, one researcher
promised that ‘‘if this procedure is found to be effective . . . it will
open a door’’ so that ‘‘inherited disease like sickle cell anemia and
hemophilia might be cured in newborns.’’ 7 But as many enthusiasts acknowledged, SCD posed particular clinical and cultural
challenges. Most informed observers knew that SCD’s therapeutic
past had been defined by steady progress. But this history was also
replete with sporadic bouts of overpromises, complex therapeutic tradeoffs, and lingering uncertainty among patients and families as to whom or what to believe. Moreover, because of SCD’s
symbolic significance as a ‘‘black disease,’’ researchers had often
been quick to seize upon the disease to help draw attention to the
sweeping significance of potential breakthroughs for underprivileged African Americans, in much the same way that other researchers might have invoked the whiteness of cystic fibrosis, or
pointed to breast cancer among women, in order to give broader
social meaning to their own agendas.
By the 1990s, history had taught some sickle cell researchers
to be more cautious in their promises of cures and breakthroughs
than their peers in the cystic fibrosis research community. In 1993
one popular writer commenting on the future of gene therapy
turned his attention to the controversial history of SCD. He cauA Perilous Lottery for the Black Family: Sickle Cells [121]
tioned against enthusiasm and against vaunted claims. ‘‘Finding
a gene and curing a disease are two different things,’’ wrote Bill
Deitrich in the Seattle Times. For him sickle cell disease was a case
in point. Since the late 1940s, scientists had known the cause and
had promised therapeutic breakthroughs; Deitrich noted that they
‘‘linked sickle-cell disease to a recessive gene in 1948 but are still
struggling to find a cure.’’ 8 In the 1990s, sickle cell researchers
agreed that breakthroughs aimed at the underlying cause of SCD
had been envisioned for decades, and they often urged restraint in
light of this history of largely unfulfilled promises. A distinct cultural ethos surrounded SCD, and this ethos would shape public
debate about the ups and downs of basic medical care, and about
the likelihood of revolutions to come.
the archetypal ‘‘molecular disease’’
Like cystic fibrosis, sickle cell disease went from being a relatively obscure disease to a well-known disorder midway through
the twentieth century. First conceptualized as a discrete disease
in the 1910s and 1920s, SCD had been observed from the very
beginning to be especially prevalent among African Americans.
The malady was defined by a particular set of symptoms: intense
joint pain, lethargy, deadly infections, leg ulcers, and, all too frequently, early childhood death from infectious disease, pneumonia, and the like.9 After its discovery by Chicago physician James
Herrick in 1910, SCD was widely portrayed as a rare disorder. Doctors rarely recognized the death of a sickle cell patient for what
it was, for they commonly perceived the symptoms or complications of the disease to be the cause of death. As with cystic fibrosis, in which infections caused the mortality, it would be several
decades before physicians cultivated the tools and the habits of
mind to distinguish between general cases of pneumonia or of infectious disease and the specific underlying pathologies of CF or
SCD. For this reason, in the 1930s and 1940s an obscure malady
like sickle cell remained significant only for specialists who took
[122] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
an interest in rare hematological (blood) disorders. SCD attracted
little attention among most American physicians, and when these
doctors did take notice, there was little discussion of therapy.
Linus Pauling’s work radically altered this dynamic, introducing
the possibility of molecular-level diagnosis and transforming an
obscure malady into an ‘‘archetypal disease.’’
The 1949 discovery by Pauling and his colleagues that hemoglobin—the large oxygen-carrying molecules inside red blood
cells—played a major role in the formation of sickled red blood
cells pointed not only to the mechanism of sickle cell disease
but also to the possibility of a cure.10 As in the history of cystic
fibrosis, these new insights into the underlying pathology of SCD
gave rise rather quickly to grandiose prospects for a revolutionary
therapy. Pauling’s work on the abnormal hemoglobin molecule in
sickled blood cells gave rise to an intense faith in the possibility of
a technical fix for SCD, just as the discovery and cloning of a gene
would do for CF years later. An ideology of cure emerged around
SCD in the 1950s, built around Pauling’s characterization of this
malady as a molecular disease. In effect, the idea that SCD was
reducible to abnormal hemoglobin made it possible to imagine
crafting an enzyme to desickle the crumpled hemoglobin molecule, allowing it to do its job of carrying oxygen from lungs to tissue.
In the wake of the 1949 discovery, it seemed only logical (and
not at all fantastic) to envision a new era in molecular medicine,
a reductionist medicine focused on curing the disease by creating
an enzyme and fixing the hemoglobin. The only question that remained was how this vision would be carried out. Which enzyme
would work? What mechanism would be used to alter the molecule? This simple reductionist philosophy—the idea that discrete
molecular-level anomalies caused disease—was, at the time, revolutionary. It spurred the growth of a new field of molecular biology, and within a few years the discovery of the structure of DNA
by Watson and Crick would draw even more attention to how ‘‘primary’’ molecular-level interactions explained disease processes.
A Perilous Lottery for the Black Family: Sickle Cells [123]
In the case of sickle cell disease, which soon became known as
the first ‘‘molecular disease,’’ the implications of this reductionist
philosophy would play out over decades of laboratory experiments
and clinical experiments. In contrast, the reductionist hopes surrounding gene therapy in cystic fibrosis would play out over a far
shorter time span—less than a decade—and would come much
later. Thus, by the 1990s, when these reductionist hopes were profoundly new for CF patients and their doctors, SCD patients, doctors, and families had already gone through their own vogue for
such cures, experiencing bouts of optimism and extraordinary disappointment over the often-repeated promise of an innovative,
imminent cure.
As with cystic fibrosis, the antibacterial revolution of the late
1940s and 1950s also had a dramatic impact on the health of sickle
cell patients and on the visibility of the disease. In the late 1940s
the electrophoretic analysis of hemoglobin molecules pioneered
by Pauling and his colleagues opened up the real possibility of a
molecular diagnosis for this malady. Simultaneously, antibiotics
provided effective treatments for the infections responsible for
most of the early childhood mortality. By the 1950s, therefore,
SCD had attained a higher profile that paralleled the increasing
visibility of cystic fibrosis; indeed, both were ‘‘new’’ children’s diseases. Like CF, SCD was transformed from a rare disease of limited interest in the research community into a much more prevalent and scientifically interesting disorder.11
In the years before Pauling and penicillin, physicians had experimented with a variety of treatments with little success, including transfusion, removal of the spleen, and various drug regimens; but the events of the 1940s and 1950s set in motion a search
for new kinds of treatments—so-called desickling agents—that
promised to revolutionize sickle cell care and eradicate suffering and death among African-American children. As one scientist
forecast in 1951, ‘‘[We] may be able to devise a small innocuous
molecule which will lock permanently on to the defective hemoglobin and prevent the abnormal molecule from misbehaving.’’ 12
[124] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
Such scientists, like the ‘‘gene doctors’’ two generations later,
ardently believed that technical ingenuity would soon result in
a complete victory over hereditary disease. The search for such
agents was fully engaged by the mid-1950s, but it gained momentum during the 1960s, when Civil Rights struggles and social unrest helped define the ‘‘pain and suffering’’ of SCD as a microcosm
of the African-American condition.13 As this reductionist agenda
grew in both scientific and cultural importance, the search for
desickling agents attained a particularly high profile in the early
1970s. Pressure grew for national legislation addressing the SCD
problem, and Congress and the Nixon administration rallied behind passage of the 1972 National Sickle Cell Anemia Control Act.
In this context, urea came to prominence as the long-sought desickling agent. The search for such an agent attracted much attention, but for SCD researchers and patients it quickly revealed the
limits of naïve reductionism and the hidden dangers of innovative
yet unproven therapies.
the urea debacle: the limits of
reductionism in the 1970s
The early 1970s marked the peak of national attention to sickle
cell disease, a once-obscure disorder that had risen to prominence
as a painful ‘‘discriminating disease’’ in which ‘‘99% of . . . U.S.
victims are black.’’ At the same time, a promising treatment appeared on the horizon. This novel therapy, urea, promised to be
the molecular ‘‘cure’’ that the molecular disease demanded. Urea’s
promoters saw it not only as relief for the patient but also as the
fulfillment of the long search. By 1974, however, urea had followed
a path akin to the one adenovirus gene therapy would later follow.
SCD researchers discovered toxic side effects and widely rejected
urea on those grounds, and for years to come the urea episode
would remain etched in their memories.
Urea appeared to answer the pressing needs of the moment—
a breakthrough medicine for African-American suffering. Late in
A Perilous Lottery for the Black Family: Sickle Cells [125]
1970 a Michigan researcher named Robert Nalbandian announced
that he had given doses of urea to two sickle cell patients and that
the drug had resulted in the restoration of the sickled cells to normal shape. ‘‘The approach,’’ noted another researcher at the time,
was ‘‘chemically rational and very promising.’’ 14 Quickly, the national media seized upon these developments, suggesting that the
discovery ‘‘offered new relief for sickle-cell sufferers.’’ Reports described the drug as if it were ready for widespread everyday use.
‘‘By treating the patient with a solution of urea and invert sugar,’’
Time magazine reported, ‘‘. . . the sickling tendency can be reversed
and the misshapen cells returned to normal.’’ 15 But researchers
knew that urea was a substance that carried severe risks. Nalbandian, for example, cautioned about the danger of dehydration and
warned that other effects of the drug had yet to be documented.
Many other researchers were quick to point out that Nalbandian’s
study was not a clinical trial but merely a report on a few ‘‘inhouse’’ cases.
The urea findings, and Nalbandian’s claims about a therapeutic breakthrough, immediately stirred controversy. Hematologists
greeted the announcement of this treatment with a ‘‘frosty assessment.’’ 16 As the Medical World News reported in January 1971, researchers were split between those who applauded Nalbandian’s
logical and daring initiative and those who regretted the premature celebration of an unproven drug. At one professional
meeting, ‘‘charges of irresponsibility and sensationalism met with
countercharges of scientific ignorance and illiteracy.’’ For some
researchers, the publicity itself was a big part of the problem. One
critic commented that ‘‘as a result of the widespread publicity, I
am afraid that some people are trying this therapy without proper
guidance.’’ Others were more strident in their criticism, labeling Nalbandian’s press conference on urea ‘‘terribly premature’’
and even ‘‘disgraceful.’’ Urea’s defenders noted that Nalbandian’s
news briefing had been misunderstood and that he had called it
‘‘primarily to find support for further urea trials,’’ not to promote
urea as a therapeutic breakthrough.17
[126] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
The significance of this controversy was clear to a number of
reporters, who saw that it typified molecular biology’s avid pursuit
of a ‘‘chemically rational and very promising’’ therapy while also
highlighting the cautiousness of a research culture skeptical of inflated, premature claims. By mid-1971, reporters were describing
the use of urea as highly controversial. As for Nalbandian and his
team, they were described as having scaled back their claims of
breakthrough, now saying that their research was ‘‘controversial
and too preliminary to talk about in terms of possible treatment
of the disease in the human body.’’ There were simply too many
unresolved issues. Foremost among them was ‘‘toxicity,’’ which
remained ‘‘an unanswered question.’’ 18
Over the next few months scientists and the media subjected
Nalbandian’s ‘‘breakthrough’’ to ever closer scrutiny and criticism.
In late 1971 a follow-up study reported on the problems of urea
and the severe challenge of even carrying out a proper evaluation of the earlier findings. ‘‘Properly controlled studies using the
double-blind technique are difficult’’ the study reported, ‘‘because
the diuresis [increased secretion of urine] produced by urea may
unblind both the patient and the observer after two or three hours
and 120 to 150 g of urea.’’ In other words, urea’s severe diuretic
effects made it obvious to researchers and subjects alike whether
the drug or the placebo had been administered, and this knowledge tainted the study by potentially influencing their behavior,
biasing their conclusions, and destabilizing any conclusions about
the drug’s actual worth. By late 1971 it had become clear that diuresis was not merely a nagging methodological complication in
the research effort; it was also ‘‘a major and potentially dangerous
side effect,’’ and there was already evidence that ‘‘the death of a
child with sickle-cell disease may have been partly related to the
dehydration resulting from a massive diuresis for which there was
inadequate therapeutic compensation.’’ 19
By mid-1972, observations about urea’s extreme side effects
had cast doubt on the drug’s clinical efficacy and safety; other
laboratory studies had even cast doubt on its capacity to desickle
A Perilous Lottery for the Black Family: Sickle Cells [127]
cells, regardless of the side effects.20 Then in early 1973, uncontrolled clinical trials of urea on eleven patients announced definitively that ‘‘no hematologic or clinical benefit could be observed.’’ 21 The era of urea’s celebrated promise was ending. By
1974, some of those who in 1970 had expressed admiration for
the chemical rationality of the urea ‘‘cure’’ now admitted that it
was a failure. A multi-institution study published in the Journal
of the American Medical Association in May 1974 was the final word,
finding ‘‘that urea was ineffective in relieving the acute pain that
afflicts those suffering from this incurable, hereditary blood disease.’’ The study had also considered a number of other promising agents, comparing them with a placebo, and concluded that
‘‘neither urea, nor alkali administration was found to be superior
to invert sugar alone in shortening the crisis episode.’’ 22
Urea enjoyed a brief celebrity in the glaring spotlight of 1970s
SCD politics, and its appeal at the time is easy to explain. On one
hand, urea fulfilled the longstanding need for ‘‘a small, innocuous
molecule which will lock permanently on to the defective hemoglobin and prevent the abnormal molecule from misbehaving.’’ 23
On the other hand, insofar as SCD was a microcosm of AfricanAmerican pain and suffering, urea symbolized relief at last for
an ongoing crisis in American race relations and health care. As
President Richard Nixon proclaimed when promoting sickle cell
disease legislation in 1971, ‘‘It is a sad and shameful fact that the
causes of this disease have been largely neglected throughout our
history. We cannot rewrite this record of neglect, but we can reverse it.’’ 24 Urea’s failure, then, represented a disappointment on
several levels. After the urea bubble collapsed, few experts on SCD
would be so naïve as to accept unquestioningly the idea of a surgically precise molecular cure. Though appealing in the abstract,
this sort of idea for rational therapeutics proved difficult to translate into safe and truly effective drugs.
The failure of urea in the early 1970s was a well-publicized
blow to an entire research agenda. Indeed, urea was only the most
public failure in the effort to create desickling agents; many other
[128] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
agents were promoted, studied, and prematurely celebrated for
their desickling qualities.25 In 1974, for example, a report on the
much touted sodium cyanate noted that ‘‘the evaluation of the
overall clinical efficacy of cyanate is extremely difficult because
of the nature of sickle-cell disease.’’ In other words, the complexity of SCD made it difficult to evaluate the benefits of any
single agent. As the researchers pointed out, ‘‘The three major expressions of the hemoglobinopathy [of SCD] are hemolytic anemia, organ damage, and episodes of pain called ‘crises.’’’ According to their assessment, cyanate performed well in only one
of these areas, showing positive effects only on hemolytic anemia.26 Sodium cyanate failed on the other two fronts, and other
researchers concluded that ‘‘at the present time cyanate therapy
for sickle-cell anemia can only be described as a hopeful new approach awaiting further evaluation to determine its clinical usefulness.’’ 27 Certainly this was not the molecular cure that SCD
patients and doctors had been expecting.
Despite the disappointing results with urea and sodium cyanate, the pursuit of rational and chemically appealing drugs did
not end—and neither did the controversy. Even after the apparently conclusive 1974 trials on urea, Nalbandian continued to defend his earlier results. He attacked ‘‘flaws’’ in the 1974 trials and
insisted that the truth of his original claims ‘‘has never been challenged and still holds.’’ He insisted that other researchers had
failed to follow his study’s protocols to the letter: ‘‘Where our protocols have been faithfully followed, there has not been a therapeutic failure, a medical misadventure, or a death.’’ 28 His critics
responded that although the protocols were not followed, the fundamental issue was to test Nalbandian’s hypothesis that ‘‘rapid
elevation of the blood urea concentration . . . would abort a sickle
cell crisis.’’ This hypothesis was found, without question, to be
groundless. ‘‘The urea hypothesis,’’ they concluded, ‘‘has been
tested and found wanting.’’ 29 For the time being, a cure or even
relief of the painful ‘‘crises’’ of SCD would have to depend on
something other than urea or any other desickling agent. Many
A Perilous Lottery for the Black Family: Sickle Cells [129]
physicians believed that comprehensive management of all the
symptoms afflicting the SCD patient was the key to better health.
The impact of the urea story would linger into the early 1980s.
Many clinical researchers, hematologists, and caregivers emerged
from the years-long controversy aware of the limitations of naïve
reductionism, wary of news reports, and attuned to the need for
well-organized clinical trials to test claims about breakthrough
drugs or treatments for sickle cell disease.
The spotlight on this ‘‘black disease’’ added another layer of
political meaning to public claims and counterclaims about breakthrough drugs. In the early-1970s, activists, celebrities, community leaders, the U.S. Congress, and ultimately President Nixon
himself had turned their attention to legislation to address this
disorder. For many Americans this attention was logical and justified, since ‘‘sickle cell anemia [had] for many years . . . been the
victim of neglect.’’ 30 Others viewed the new focus on SCD as a
mere concession to racial politics. Some observers in black communities regarded the increased attention cynically as well, as a
ploy by (predominantly white) scientists, physicians, and politicians to garner increased federal support by capitalizing on the
social plight of African Americans.31 As one editorialist noted
frankly in 1971, ‘‘It can be taken as an axiom of American life, that
whenever a good cause comes along, those who would exploit it
for their own advantage are never far behind. A case in point is
sickle cell anemia.’’ 32 Such cynics were quick to see promises of
cure merely as exploitation going by another name.
The actions and words of the experts themselves offered plenty
of fuel for cynics. Linus Pauling himself, so closely associated with
the discovery of the sickle cell hemoglobin and with the search for
a desickling agent, helped stir controversy in 1968 when he wrote,
‘‘There should be tattooed on the forehead of every young person
a symbol showing possession of the sickle-cell gene or whatever
other similar gene . . . that he has been found to possess in a single
allele.’’ It seemed clear to many such experts that even as they
hoped for cures, identifying would-be parents who both carried
[130] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
the sickle cell trait and counseling them about their 25 percent
chance of having a child with SCD would be crucial to controlling
the disease in the future. Pauling took the idea to an absurd new
level, suggesting that the tattoo would allow people carrying the
trait to identify one another early in life. ‘‘If this were done,’’ he
suggested, ‘‘two young people carrying the same seriously defective gene in a single dose would recognize this situation at first
sight, and would refrain from falling in love with one another.’’ 33
In the context of the racial politics of the late 1960s and early
1970s, such a suggestion was inflammatory. This outrageous idea
nurtured cynicism about genetic screening, suggesting—both at
the time and for years to come—that the proponents of genetic
counseling and screening were focused more on the control of reproduction and on their own agendas than on promoting health
per se in black communities. Pauling’s notion and Nalbandian’s
zealous claims would be remembered, along with other insults. In
light of such a history, SCD researchers began approaching innovative treatments with a great deal of caution.34
Although in 1970 some experts may have continued to regard
sickle cell disease as a simple technical problem that might yield
to a technical fix, by mid-decade many had become cautious and
acutely aware of the complex clinical and sociological problem
that was SCD.35 To be sure, scientists continued to look for safe,
rational desickling methods—experimenting with kidney machines, radio frequency waves, and chemotherapies—in hopes of
succeeding where urea had failed.36 But the failure of urea had
produced one tangible benefit: the raising of standards and cultural sensibilities among SCD researchers. First of all, it had become clear that even in desickling, prevention worked better than
cure. As one reviewer put it, any antisickling therapy ‘‘must almost
certainly be prophylactic rather than curative: It is substantially
more difficult to depolymerize HbS [the abnormal hemoglobin
molecule] than it is to prevent it from depolymerizing in the first
place.’’ In addition, the diuretic effects of urea had highlighted the
fact that any potential new antisickling agent must be very safe,
A Perilous Lottery for the Black Family: Sickle Cells [131]
‘‘since it will be used on a daily basis throughout the patient’s
life.’’ 37 After urea, safety became a key concern. Therapeutic goals
also broadened in the late 1970s and early 1980s beyond a search
for cures. As two researchers argued in 1982, the allure of innovative cures had diminished greatly, and ‘‘even if a new cure bursts
forth,’’ most observers understood that ‘‘it would not be as safe
and effective as chloroquine for malaria or penicillin for pneumonia.’’ Instead, the researchers concluded that while we wait for
cures to come along, ‘‘we should try to improve our present means
for delivering care.’’ 38
By the early 1980s, then, at the dawn of the discovery of genes
causing cystic fibrosis and other diseases, and amid a groundswell
of optimism for gene therapy, the sickle cell research community
was just recovering from the disastrous infatuation with urea and
desickling agents. The controversies over coercive genetic counseling also resounded in public and professional memory. Any
breakthroughs in the management of genetic disease that might
emerge in the 1980s and 1990s would be assessed against a backdrop of concern about safety, caution about the dangers of inflated therapeutic promises, and anxiety over the highly charged
language attached to this ‘‘black disease.’’
therapy as social justice: pain and infection
care in a ‘‘highly charged atmosphere’’
Even though researchers defined sickle cell disease as a ‘‘blood
disease’’ (a hemoglobinopathy), its most disturbing features, from
doctors’ and patients’ perspectives, were the intense recurrent
pain and life-threatening infections. During the 1980s, these two
realities of SCD—pain and infection—came to dominate clinical
and public understanding and to overshadow grand hopes of a
cure. The clinical management of pain and infection was never far
removed from troubling social issues; in the context of American
race politics, debates about the use of narcotics in alleviating pain
or expensive antibiotics in combating infections often became ve[132] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
Sickle Cell Disease
‘‘the archetypal molecular disease’’
Understanding of SCD has evolved rapidly since Linus Pauling first
characterized it as a molecular disease. Its current scientific and
medical profile includes the following characterizations.
Carrier Frequency
Disease Incidence
Inheritance
Cause
Mechanism
Symptoms
1 in 12 African Americans
1 in 500 African Americans
Autosomal recessive
Unlike other autosomal recessive diseases,
SCD is less frequently described as a
‘‘genetic’’ disorder than as a ‘‘molecular
defect.’’ Yet the cause of SCD has been
identified as a mutation of the
hemoglobin B (HbB) gene on
chromosome 11.
Hemoglobin molecules allow red blood cells
to carry oxygen through the bloodstream
and give those cells their characteristic
color. SCD patients have abnormal
hemoglobins (hemoglobin S) that stick to
one another and form long rodlike
structures that cause red blood cells to
become rigid and assume a sickle shape.
These sickle cells pile up and block the
flow of blood through vessels, causing
pain and resulting in damage to vital
tissue and organs (especially the spleen,
kidneys, and liver).
Episodes of acute pain known as ‘‘crises’’
(may include pain in joints, bones, or
abdomen), anemia, fever, fatigue,
breathlessness, rapid heart rate,
susceptibility to infections, delayed
growth and puberty, leg ulcers, jaundice,
and priapism. Patients have an extremely
Diagnosis
Treatments
Prevention
high risk of stroke and can suffer longterm complications such as lung tissue
damage and cardiovascular disease.
Blood tests are available for both the sickle
cell trait and the disease. Tests include
the standard CBC (complete blood count),
the sickle cell test, which can detect the
presence or absence of abnormal
hemoglobin (HbS), and hemoglobin
electrophoresis, which can measure the
different types of hemoglobin in the
blood.
A combination of fluids, painkillers,
antibiotics, and blood transfusions are
used to treat symptoms and complications
of SCD. The antitumor drug hydroxyurea
has been shown to be effective in
preventing painful crises. Though risky,
bone marrow transplantation is an option
for some patients that may lead to cure.
Prenatal testing for fetuses is possible using
amniocentesis or chorionic villi sampling
to identify the HbB gene. Carrier testing is
available for adults.
hicles for expressing anxiety about ‘‘inner city’’ drug addiction, the
rising cost of medical care for the poor, and the pursuit of a health
care system that was socially fair and just to African Americans.
The management of infection, in the lungs and other organs,
commanded a great deal of attention in sickle cell research in the
1970s and 1980s; it was a crucial issue in basic care. Like their
counterparts in cystic fibrosis, SCD doctors began to take a closer
look at the extensive use of a wide range of antibiotics to fight the
blood infections (septicemia) so common among SCD patients.
[134] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
Sickle Cell Disease
controversies in prevention and therapy
At many junctures in the history of SCD, discussions of therapeutics and prevention have been shadowed by controversy. From Linus
Pauling’s controversial comments in the 1960s on methods to prevent SCD carriers from marrying to debates in the 1990s over bone
marrow transplantation and other high-risk interventions, physicians and researchers have vigorously debated the pros and cons. The
debate has often intertwined with broader discussions about race,
equality, and fairness in American society.
‘‘There should be tattooed on the forehead of every young person a
symbol showing possession of the sickle-cell gene or whatever other
similar gene . . . that he has been found to possess in a single allele
. . . If this were done, two young people carrying the same seriously
defective gene in a single dose would recognize this situation at first
sight, and would refrain from falling in love with one another.’’
—Linus Pauling, molecular biology pioneer and
Nobel Prize laureate, 1968
‘‘It is clear to me that the level of mortality, for a procedure intended
to cure a disease that manifests such diverse patient-to-patient
phenotypic expression, is clearly unacceptable if marrow transplantation is intended as an across-the-board recommendation . . . [It]
is not the physician but the patient who should be making the final
decision . . . unfortunately, because the patient usually tends to be
very young, this decision will fall on the parent or guardian . . . Is
there not room for [parents] taking risk for the wrong reasons? What
if some parents or guardians decide on marrow transplantation because they believe they cannot provide appropriate support to their
child for socioeconomic reasons?’’
—Ronald Nagel, SCD researcher and physician, 1991
‘‘Little would be gained by sickle cell disease patients if they merely
traded the morbidity associated with their primary disorder for a new
set of disabling symptoms resulting from their treatment.’’
—Ernest Beutler, hematologist, 1991
‘‘We heard an argument that a 10% mortality with transplantation
may not be acceptable . . . On the other hand, we have heard that the
quality of the life for sickle cell patients in many instances is perhaps worse than death . . . This is going to be a very subjective decision . . . Some physicians would demand that marrow grafting have
almost a zero risk before it should be undertaken in sickle cell disease. It think that is an excessive requirement.’’
—E. Donnall Thomas, bone marrow transplantation pioneer
and Nobel Prize laureate, 1991
Their discussions focused on the wisdom of using penicillin as a
prevention against pneunonoccocal infections.The issue attracted
public attention in 1986 when researchers announced that the repeated use of ‘‘inexpensive penicillin pills’’ during infancy helped
‘‘those suffering from the disease to get past the first few years of
life when they are highly susceptible to the strep infection [septicemia].’’ These findings emerged so unexpectedly and the ‘‘results
were so dramatic that researchers stopped the study eight months
earlier than planned.’’ In a field in which researchers had grown
cautious about inflated promises, some offered muted expressions of hope regarding prophylactic penicillin.39 As researcher
Clarice Reid noted in an interview with Black Enterprise, ‘‘I don’t like
to use the word breakthrough . . . But we can now show that this
drug therapy (oral penicillin for SCD infants) can make a difference.’’ 40
Prophylactic penicillin became standard for children with
sickle cell disease in the 1980s, but doubts about the practice lingered—among them, questions about the cost. In 1991, for example, Miami-based researchers pointed out that this method was
not perfect and that ‘‘pneumococcal bacteremia with its resultant high mortality rate must be expected to occur despite the
prescription of penicillin prophylaxis.’’ 41 Penicillin did not solve
the problem of infections among SCD patients, and the increas[136] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
ing use of antibacterial agents carried significant risks (witness
the increasing prevalence of Pseudomonas infections among cystic fibrosis patients). Two Dallas-based researchers noted that
a regime of prophylactic penicillin was perhaps warranted only
for the highest-risk SCD patients: ‘‘Young children with SC disease . . . may not require penicillin prophylaxis because . . . they
are not at high risk of having pneumococcal septicemia.’’ 42 They
insisted that antibiotics should not be a standard part of SCD
care but should be evaluated on a case-by-case basis. And as the
1990s ushered in a new era of medical cost-cutting and managed
care, the problem with prophylactic penicillin was increasingly regarded as one of expense.
The long-term financial implications of extended antibiotic
use, coupled with its variable efficacy and the growing problem of
antibiotic-resistant bacteria, conspired against standardized use
of prophylactic antibiotics in SCD care. The problem, of course,
would have been familiar to CF physicians, for they too were
grappling with whether standardized care was even possible, let
alone desirable, given the enormous variation from patient to
patient and the rise of antibiotic-resistant strains of bacteria. For
an increasing number of physicians, hopes for standardized antibacterial care seemed doomed by the resilience of nature itself.
As one SCD researcher put it, standardized use of penicillin in
‘‘very young children may . . . hasten the emergence of penicillinresistant strains of S. pneumoniae while providing little benefit.’’ 43
Other studies echoed these anxieties, pointing to the ‘‘increasing
problem of antibiotic-resistant pneumococcal infection in children with sickle cell disease in the U.S.’’ 44
By late 1995, however, some SCD physicians were insisting that
the real issue was not penicillin per se but building a comprehensive system that provided better access to the range of therapies
needed for the complex malady. As one observer noted, ‘‘Children
with sickle cell anemia who are receiving comprehensive care have
a low risk of having pneumococcal bacteremia or meningitis regardless of whether or not they continue to receive prophylactic
A Perilous Lottery for the Black Family: Sickle Cells [137]
penicillin.’’ Indeed, prophylactic penicillin might even be scaled
back where patients had access to a robust system of medical
care: ‘‘Children with sickle cell anemia who have not had a prior
severe pneumococcal infection . . . and are receiving comprehensive care, may safely stop prophylactic penicillin therapy at 5 years
of age.’’ 45 Such comments raised the question of whether the particular drugs were the issue or whether the health care system in
general was failing poor children.
Because a significant percentage of sickle cell patients were
both poor and black, and because programs like Medicaid often
financed medical services for this portion of the patient community, questions about the quality of SCD treatment often elided
with conservative anxieties about the cost of ‘‘welfare’’ programs
and with liberal concerns about achieving racial equality. From
one standpoint, the key concern with SCD was containing health
care costs and reducing the heavy expense of federal medical programs. From another perspective, the issue was poor people’s lack
of access to sound health insurance and their difficulties gaining
access to care. In 1993, for example, two researchers writing on
pain management in hematology insisted that one of the problems of the specialty was that ‘‘Medicaid patients . . . received the
most expensive class of pain medications at a significantly higher
rate than other patients.’’ 46 As for antibiotics, some physicians insisted that the development of outpatient antibacterial therapy for
febrile patients with sickle cell disease was a good investment and
would bring ‘‘substantial reductions in cost.’’ 47 Such discussions
of the economics of SCD treatment should be understood as part
of the evolving social debates of the 1980s and 1990s over the control of rising costs, the scaling back of federal government programs, and access to health care—all of these being issues with
strong racial undercurrents.
As it had in the 1970s, the recurrent and fierce joint, abdominal, and back pain associated with sickle cell disease continued
to embody personal and racial meanings in the 1980s and 1990s.
[138] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
The ‘‘painful crises’’—pain and suffering long ignored in black
America—were perhaps the most important aspect of patients’
experience of the disorder, even though pain itself was not a primary cause of mortality. Pain increasingly occupied SCD doctors
and patients, in the same way that lung damage had become the
primary concern of CF doctors and patients in the 1970s. In both
cases patient advocates drew attention, quite naturally, to those
features of the disease that they deemed to be most vital. Thus,
from the 1970s through the 1990s, pain management in SCD continued to be a top priority for clinical practice and research.
But pain management in sickle cell disease proved to be a difficult and endlessly controversial matter. A central problem was the
enduring fear among practitioners of ‘‘creating addicts’’ through
the irregular use of narcotic painkillers and analgesics. For many,
erring on the side of caution—prescribing fewer narcotics—was
the best policy. For others, liberal prescribing was best, for it addressed patients’ profound agony and was an index of medicine’s
compassion. As two thoughtful practitioners noted in the early
1980s, the therapeutic questions overlapped with questions of
race relations and cross-cultural understanding: ‘‘Sickle cell anemia . . . occurs in black patients who still face obstacles that whites
don’t appreciate . . . Treatable complaints must be recognized,
painful episodes must be managed.’’ 48
Increasing skepticism about liberal pain management emerged
in the 1980s and 1990s, contrasting sharply with attitudes of the
1960s and 1970s, when attention to the social condition of African Americans had first brought the pain of sickle cell disease to
public and medical prominence. ‘‘Go to any hospital frequented
by blacks,’’ noted one author in the 1970s, ‘‘and you will see them
. . . The one thing they will all have in common is the memory of
excruciating pain. Those who are in the hospital are there usually
because they have undergone a recent ‘crisis.’’’ 49 Because of such
portraits, acute, recurring bouts of pain remained central to the
cultural meaning of SCD. Indeed, researchers often measured the
A Perilous Lottery for the Black Family: Sickle Cells [139]
efficacy of the new desickling agents by their potential to reduce
or eliminate these painful events. Patients often knew better than
their doctors what mixture of painkillers worked best for them,
and some often required escalating doses to endure the crises. But
skepticism about the authenticity of pain also began to creep into
clinical discussions. Medicine’s inability to measure pain objectively made it necessary for emergency room doctors, nurses, and
sickle cell specialists to rely on their own judgment when making
decisions about how or whether to treat a patient’s pain.50
Not surprisingly, in the increasingly conservative 1980s and
1990s, with public skepticism running high about welfare cheats
and drug addicts, alternatives to the use of narcotics in pain management occupied the attention of some leading researchers.51
Pain management in sickle cell disease had always required a
broad point of view. As Boston physician Orah Platt noted, a variety of factors now played into how doctors were choosing to
treat (or not to treat) sickle cell pain: ‘‘The variability and unpredictability of the healing process, the repetitive nature of the
pain, the lack of objective signs, the disquieting need for escalating does of narcotic agents, and the well-founded fear of iatrogenic (i.e., medically induced) respiratory suppression, and the
less well-founded fear of narcotic addiction contribute to the
highly charged atmosphere that often characterizes the care of
desperately uncomfortable patients with sickle cell crises.’’ 52 Increasingly, such fears played a leading role in therapeutic choices.
A nurse’s skepticism about a patient’s pain or a doctor’s ‘‘fear
of narcotic addiction’’ created formidable obstacles for patients
seeking pain relief. Other perceptions also came into play. As one
physician noted in 1993, ‘‘In this emergency room, because of
both the nature of the disease and the nature of the neighborhood
we’re in (an urban, largely black community), [sickle cell disease
is] seen most often in young, poor blacks—the very same population in which we most worry about narcotic addiction in the first
place.’’ As such physicians knew, the medical and social anxiety
[140] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
about addiction placed a huge burden on SCD patients: ‘‘Add all
this up and it becomes way too easy for jaded doctors and nurses
to dismiss a young sickle-cell patient as a faker just out to get
drugs.’’ 53 Another doctor put it this way: ‘‘Before you can get past
the agony, you have to convince a doctor that it’s real.’’ 54
As in the story of Tay-Sachs and cystic fibrosis, a particular
cultural ethos surrounded sickle cell patient care and gave meaning to the disease. As in CF, therapeutic progress in SCD brought
many frustrations. Progress was further complicated by a charged
political climate that at every turn changed therapeutic discussions into racial debates. Issues of care became inseparable from
broader issues of fairness, compassion, social justice, and racial
injustice. But also as in the CF story, there was hope of imminent
breakthroughs, and two promising innovations emerged in the
late 1980s and the 1990s: a drug (hydroxyurea) promoted as a genetic switch to turn on healthy hemoglobin; and a technique (bone
marrow transplantation) to produce healthy blood cells. The appeal of these innovations lay in part in the fact that they both
promised technical solutions to the full range of social, cultural,
and medical complexities of SCD: if they worked, these methods
would make the exceedingly complex social controversies simply
go away. Yet even here, previous disappointments with ‘‘breakthroughs’’ brought out the cautiousness now ingrained among
SCD professionals and tempered their enthusiasm. Many physicians continued to stress the practical matters—pain management and prophylactic penicillin—that were most crucial in the
lives of African Americans with SCD. But some doctors and researchers still hoped for a true breakthrough. As a profile of researcher Clarice Reid noted in 1988, ‘‘Although oral penicillin
serves as an effective treatment, [she] sees two other possibilities: bone marrow transplantation and gene therapy.’’ 55 Alongside
frustrations with the political complexities of SCD care, there also
ran hope that such new developments might sweep away these
contentious issues once and for all.
A Perilous Lottery for the Black Family: Sickle Cells [141]
secondhand hope: hydroxyurea flips
the genetic switch
Hydroxyurea (HU), a drug used for treating leukemia, brought
genetic medicine to the bedside of sickle cell patients in the 1990s,
and its immediate appeal as a treatment for SCD stemmed in no
small part from its purported ability to address many of the sociomedical issues that complicated patients’ lives. Hydroxyurea was
something new, it was said. It was part of a new class of drugs
that apparently held out the same ‘‘dazzling promise’’ as had urea
and the other therapeutic breakthroughs of the 1970s, but without
the side effects. In the early 1990s, HU was greeted by the popular
media and professionals alike as part of the revolution in genetic
medicine, for it was said to work like a ‘‘genetic switch’’ for regulating the production of nonsickling red blood cells. Adding to
its appeal, the drug also showed promise for reducing the number of painful episodes that patients suffered, thereby diminishing
the need for hospitalization and saving patients, insurers, and the
health care system money in the long run. When HU appeared in
the 1990s, it thus seemed to be an ideal drug for addressing SCD
at every level—at the molecular and genetic level, at the level of
the patient’s experience, in the clinic, and also in the larger economy of SCD care.
The advent of HU reflected two developments in genetic medicine. The first was the growing use of recombinant DNA techniques in drug production. The second was the emergence of what
would become known as genetic drug therapies: a class of drugs
that apparently turned genes on, turned them off, regulated their
production of proteins, or (in the case of gene therapy) altered
them by replacing parts of the DNA. The first of these promising
genetic drugs therapies for sickle cell disease—a kind of precursor to HU—had appeared in the early 1980s. In December 1982 a
Newsweek article entitled ‘‘Switch on Genes’’ hailed the recent findings on 5-azacytidine. Basing its report on a study published in
the New England Journal of Medicine, Newsweek noted that researchers
[142] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
had given this well-known cancer drug to patients with SCD and
beta-thalassemia and had witnessed ‘‘a sharp rise in hemoglobin
levels and . . . improvement in symptoms.’’ 56 Time magazine reported that 5-azacytidine worked by reactivating ‘‘apparently intact genes that had been dormant since birth’’ so as to produce
fetal hemoglobin cells. This was a crucial development, since fetal hemoglobin cells did not sickle as did adult hemoglobin. The
drug apparently worked like a switch to activate the production of
cells that had last been seen in the patient’s infancy.
In keeping with the rising expectations of the time, the Time
article looked forward to the day when ‘‘genetic switches’’ would
be followed by new forms of ‘‘genetic surgery,’’ a future in which
doctors would eventually ‘‘use recombinant DNA techniques to
cut out ‘bad’ genes and substitute ‘good’ ones.’’ Echoing the
forward-looking, optimistic beliefs of genetic researchers, such
popular accounts saw 5-azacytidine as a harbinger of medicine to
come, ‘‘a major new step in treating disease [that] demonstrates
beyond doubt that genetic manipulation has come to the bedside.’’ 57 For the remainder of the 1980s, researchers speculated
openly about the ‘‘long-term goal of gene therapy for sickle cell
disease,’’ a goal that seemed quite attainable, awaiting only ‘‘additional technical advances for increasing the efficiency of gene
transfer and the level of gene expression.’’ 58 Longtime SCD researchers acknowledged that ‘‘replacing defective genes with normal ones [would be] ‘the ultimate therapy.’ ’’ 59 Yet SCD researchers also knew that 5-azacytidine was not an ideal genetic switch.
The safety of the 5-azacytidine compound remained in question
throughout the 1980s, and when SCD researchers learned that the
agent was carcinogenic in laboratory animals, the enthusiasm for
this particular cancer drug quickly disappeared.
The failure of 5-azacytidine to prove itself a viable drug for
sickle cell disease did not, however, dampen enthusiasm for less
toxic compounds that might act as a genetic switch for producing
nonsickling hemoglobin cells. Hydroxyurea, a drug often used in
the treatment of leukemia and the blood disorder polycythemia
A Perilous Lottery for the Black Family: Sickle Cells [143]
vera, now moved into the spotlight. Like 5-azacytidine, HU had
been shown to increase fetal hemoglobin production in SCD patients. The goal of HU therapy was not to cure the disease; in the
words of Johns Hopkins researcher Samuel Charache, it was ‘‘to
produce a milder form of sickle cell disease in adults by increasing
the levels of fetal hemoglobin.’’ But it remained unclear whether
HU could actually do the job reliably, said Charache. ‘‘The treatment works very well for some patients and not at all for others,
but we don’t know why.’’ In view of these and other uncertainties, six medical centers had begun clinical trials on HU in the
late 1980s. The studies sought to examine the impact of HU not
only on fetal hemoglobin production but also on the frequency of
painful episodes. Within months, the trials had begun to confirm
what researchers like Charache suspected: HU worked. Yet, as he
noted cautiously, ‘‘we have never precisely defined what crises are
and placebo effects are very powerful, so even though it came out
the way we’d like, this doesn’t really mean anything. We have to do
a controlled trial before anyone is going to believe that HU does
anything for these patients.’’ He also warned that HU was still considered a ‘‘dangerous drug.’’ 60
Such words of caution could not stand in the way of popular
and professional endorsement of HU as another promising ‘‘genetic switch.’’ Even though HU’s value lay in its potential to reduce the number of crises or, as Charache had said, to produce a
‘‘milder form of SCD,’’ some saw this ‘‘genetic switch’’ as a revolutionary break from all other therapies.61 ‘‘For the first time,’’ stated
NIH researcher Griffin Rodgers, ‘‘we’re treating the underlying
disease, instead of simply the complications.’’ The ‘‘genetic’’ label
became affixed to HU, placing it in a separate category of therapy from existing treatments for pain and infection. HU promised to accomplish what urea and the other desickling agents had
been unable to do. Rodgers and others insisted, however, that
their enthusiasm should not be interpreted as premature endorsement, since these results were still preliminary: ‘‘At the current
time, treatment with such agents such as HU and/or recombi[144] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
nant human erythropoetin should be considered experimental,
and efforts should be made to enroll eligible patients into ongoing
clinical trials, where possible.’’ 62 Other researchers cautioned that
‘‘several issues of hydroxyurea therapy remain unresolved, including differences in patients’ drug clearance, predictability of drug
response, reversibility of sickle cell disease–related organ damage by hydroxyurea, and the efficacy of elevated HbF [fetal hemoglobin].’’ 63 In 1994 even Charache noted that there were many
anomalies about HU—among them, the odd fact that ‘‘crises decreased during treatment, but this decrease was noted before the
HbF levels increased.’’ 64 The growing optimism for this new ‘‘genetic switch’’ was thus counterbalanced by questions about the
actual value of HU for the total experience of SCD: pain, infection,
early mortality, strokes, and so on. Researchers remained circumspect about HU even as they embraced its properties as a ‘‘genetic
switch.’’
Dramatic confirmation of HU’s value came in early 1995 when
Charache announced that the Bristol-Myers drug had been judged
highly effective in reducing the number of crises—so effective, in
fact, that the multicenter clinical trials had been halted abruptly.
Charache remained cautious, however. In a field too often given
to hyperbole and inflated rhetoric about ‘‘breakthroughs’’ and
‘‘cures,’’ he stressed that ‘‘we want to emphasize that hydroxyurea
is a treatment for the disease and not a cure.’’ The trials confirmed
that HU had ‘‘reduced by 50 percent the number of pain episodes
[experienced by patients, as well as] hospitalizations, situations
requiring blood transfusion and incidents of a life-threatening
complication called acute chest syndrome, which is characterized
by fever and severe chest pain.’’ There was little question that the
drug made life with the disease a bit more bearable; but the disease remained. And the trials also raised questions that would not
be answered for years to come. In 1995, for instance, ‘‘the only adverse effect [then known] was that high dose hydroxyurea caused
the suppression of bone marrow, which makes blood cells [and
that this effect] might increase the risk of a type of leukemia.’’ 65
A Perilous Lottery for the Black Family: Sickle Cells [145]
As with 5-azacytidine, the long-term risk of cancer loomed. Medical use of the breakthrough drug would entail the same kind of
risk-benefit calculus that had shaped the long history of SCD care
from the rise and fall of urea into the age of 5-azacytidine and prophylactic penicillin.
The HU trials also drew public attention to the significant economic interests of drug companies, researchers, and patients in
the new drug. In January 1995 a Wall Street Journal article noted that
the clinical trials were a crucial milestone for the drug’s manufacturer, since ‘‘until it is approved, Bristol-Myers is forbidden from
marketing the drug for the malady, but yesterday’s announcement
[of the halting of the trial] is expected—indeed, intended—to encourage doctors treating patients with severe forms of the disease
to prescribe it.’’ 66 Charache hoped that following this announcement, the Food and Drug Administration would quickly approve
the drug, a move that might, he believed, persuade insurance companies to provide coverage so that physicians would be reimbursed
for using HU. ‘‘If a third-party payer says he’s not going to pay
until the drug is approved, it will leave a lot of patients out in the
cold,’’ Charache stated. The clinical trials were significant for multiple groups—patients, drug companies, doctors, and insurers—
and were instrumental in bringing the new drug to the marketplace and to the bedside. HU was an exemplary instance of ‘‘basic
research [reaching] the clinic, and many observers waited eagerly
for the drug to come into wider use.’’ 67
In late 1996, as HU was becoming increasingly integrated into
the care of sickle cell patients, a familiar pattern emerged: researchers now turned to the problem of long-term adverse consequences, and their optimism gave way to more cautious pronouncements. Writing in the pages of the Hematology Oncology
Clinics of North America, Charache commented that the ‘‘long-term
risks are worrisome.’’ Researchers had confirmed that ‘‘development of leukemia [in patients with polycythemia vera] was more
common in patients treated with hydroxyurea.’’ 68 The status of
HU therapy in SCD continued to be debated into the late 1990s
[146] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
and through 2004. Most researchers stood by its positive effects
on the crises, but they also worried about the long-term risk of
leukemia—dangers that were evident quite early in the history of
the ‘‘genetic switch’’ drug.
Hydroxyurea provided yet another example of what had become a recurring theme in the ups and downs of therapy for sickle
cell disease. There were, it seemed, no true and lasting breakthroughs without long-term costs; there were no radical, transformative cures, only perilous tradeoffs. As in the story of gene
therapy for cystic fibrosis, there were significant financial interests in HU. But whereas CF researchers saw gene therapy as a
breakthrough cure and embraced the idea of complete disease
transformation, SCD researchers viewed HU (as Charache had
noted) through a more cautious lens. At best, HU was a drug
that produced ‘‘a milder form of SCD.’’ Its users would not find
cures; rather, they would be walking a new and perilous therapeutic tightrope if they could get access to the new drugs. For many
doctors and patients, a kind of sobriety about curative claims had
become part of the ethic of care. Not surprisingly, then, the promise of bone marrow transplantation for SCD would also prompt
concerns. What unseen dangers and tradeoffs lay hidden in this
innovative venture?
a dangerous way out: the bone
marrow transplant lottery
The use of bone marrow transplantation (BMT) to treat sickle
cell disease represented an extreme version of the perilous therapeutic situation posed by hydroxyurea—not so much a tightrope
as a perverse therapeutic lottery. The lottery metaphor is an apt
one. As the bone marrow transplantation option emerged in the
early 1990s, it raised intense debate about whether the extraordinary risks of the procedure made it too dangerous to offer patients
and families, even if its benefits were also extraordinary. The discussion about BMT for sickle cell disease had curious parallels to
A Perilous Lottery for the Black Family: Sickle Cells [147]
the simultaneous public discussion about lotteries in general. As
one 1992 editorial in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch put it, ‘‘Blacks and
Hispanics consistently play lotteries more frequently than whites.
Many state lotteries have even devised separate marketing strategies aimed at black and Hispanic players in what can only be described as a despicable attempt to plunder two already economically oppressed minorities.’’ 69 The questions that emerged around
BMT, although they were cast in the muted tones of academic discussion, followed similar lines as American debates over state lotteries. Was this high-risk gamble a heroic way out of a life of frustration, poverty, and pain? Or was it a false dream, a tragic form
of exploitation?
In late 1984 national media sources reported that ‘‘doctors have
cured a case of sickle cell anemia with a bone marrow transplant.’’ Such reports fanned out across the broadcast spectrum,
but below the headlines they cautioned that ‘‘this life-saving therapy will be suitable for only a small minority of victims of the disease’’ and that ‘‘the transplants [are] fatal about 30 percent of the
time.’’ 70 An array of limiting factors meant that not all patients
with SCD but only a minority of them would be suitable candidates for BMT. The crucial qualifying factor was that transplantation required the availability of donors with matching bone marrow, usually siblings or close relatives. But such matches—human
leukocyte antigen (HLA) matches—were not assured even among
family members. Even when HLA-matched donors could be arranged, embedded in the technology was a troubling conundrum.
BMT offered the possibility of unambiguous ‘‘cure’’ from SCD, but
it also came with high risks of death during the procedure. From
the outset, then, reports on BMT and sickle cell disease provoked
controversy. Even amid the excitement about the single patient
who had been cured, researchers’ optimism was constrained by
the moral and ethical complexity of this risky advance.71
There were other troubling problems with using BMT in sickle
cell disease. Researchers were aware of one long-term consequence: the likelihood (also high) that patients would be neither
[148] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
cured nor killed but would develop ‘‘major immunological complications, particularly graft-vs.-host disease, which currently
limit[s] the more widespread use of marrow transplantation in the
therapy of sickle cell anemia.’’ Graft-versus-host disease (GVHD),
a profound and often devastating immunological attack by the
transplanted organ (the graft) on the recipient (the host), could
often (though not always) be managed as a chronic disease. This
potential outcome amounted to the replacement of one chronic
condition (SCD) with another (GVHD). GVHD could also be fatal.
For all of these reasons, bone marrow transplantation remained highly controversial and extraordinarily limited in its appeal. Certainly, its impact on overall rates of sickle cell disease
would be slight. Debate on the ethics of offering the procedure
to patients and families roiled the hematology field through the
1980s. As two researchers noted in 1989, ‘‘The use of this technique at its present stage of development for the treatment of . . .
sickle cell anemia . . . is controversial, raises serious ethical issues,
and cannot be recommended routinely at this time.’’ 72 The riskbenefit calculus surrounding BMT forced sickle cell patients and
their hematologists to weigh the benefit of this potential ‘‘cure’’
against the relatively high probabilities of another costly chronic
disease and even death.
The intense debate about the pros and cons of bone marrow
transplantation continued into the 1990s.73 Many hematologists
had come together at an August 1990 conference at the Fred
Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle, Washington, to
discuss the new ‘‘cure’’ that was causing such a stir in the field.
For many, the question of BMT came back to the question of what
physicians owed to their patients, what risks and choices ought to
be offered to them, and whether BMT should be understood as an
‘‘experiment’’ or as an ‘‘innovative therapy.’’ The conference, not
surprisingly, revealed sharp divisions and conflicting opinions.
There were those who believed that dreams of quick cures simply
distracted researchers, patients, families, and the public from the
goal of providing the comprehensive care—the management of
A Perilous Lottery for the Black Family: Sickle Cells [149]
infections, pain, and symptoms—that truly advanced the lives of
most SCD patients but that still eluded far too many. For these researchers, it was more appropriate to think about therapeutic advances that benefited larger numbers rather than troubling breakthroughs for the few. And then there were those who advocated
the path of dramatic risk-taking. For them, BMT was a bold step
in the long pursuit of significant breakthroughs. Considering that
the researchers could not agree among themselves about the appropriateness of BMT, it should come as no surprise that they also
disagreed strongly on the question of how this option should be
presented (if at all) to SCD patients, research subjects, and their
families.
Such explicit professional discussion of the risks and purported benefits of bone marrow transplantation stood in dramatic
contrast to the discussions then unfolding in the world of cystic fibrosis. CF was becoming increasingly known as a Caucasian
malady. As we saw in the previous chapter, there were exalted expectations among CF patients, physicians, and researchers of an
imminent gene therapy breakthrough. Hopes ran high; experimental risks were embraced; and new entrepreneurial ventures
promised huge profits for venture capitalists and longer, healthier
lives for CF patients. A very different and far less optimistic sensibility surrounded SCD. By now it should be clear that dramatically different historical experiences shaped this sensibility. There
were many past controversies to reflect upon, numerous promises
made and unfulfilled; there were the fraught meanings of ‘‘experimentation’’ in the black community and lingering questions about
the high price and limited impact of innovation for patients; and
finally, there was frustration about the widespread lack of access
to basic care. The troubling legacy of stigma, the fears of exploitation, and the cynicism of many African Americans about SCD
care emerged directly out of therapeutic encounters; ambivalence,
wariness, and skepticism grew, quite naturally, alongside every
promise of cure.
[150] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
In their reflections on the bone marrow transplantation question, many sickle cell researchers looked back over the history of
promises and setbacks and voiced their by-now ingrained caution.
Speaking of the effects of BMT in Cooley’s anemia, one researcher
noted that ‘‘bone marrow transplantation was associated with as
much as 25% mortality and the event-free survival was as low as
65%.’’ At the very least, he noted, ‘‘one has to be selective of the
type of patient that can be transplanted, rather than transplant
all patients indiscriminately.’’ 74 Ronald Nagel, a New York–based
physician, agreed: ‘‘It is clear to me that the level of mortality, for
a procedure intended to cure a disease that manifests such diverse
patient-to-patient phenotypic expression, is clearly unacceptable
if marrow transplantation is intended as an across-the-board recommendation.’’ 75 Not only were mortality risks too high, he suggested, but the variability in how SCD manifested itself in patients
made it all the more difficult to determine which patients should
be offered this roll of the dice.
These cautious comments revealed that the calculations and
tradeoffs inherent in many other therapeutic modalities had become explicit, and impossible to ignore, with the advent of bone
marrow transplantation. Researchers still had imprecise knowledge about variations from patient to patient—with respect to
pain, anemia, or other clinical problems—and it was unclear how
these variations should inform the evaluation of new drugs and
procedures. Yet another problem made obvious by the BMT question was that some therapies offering ‘‘cures’’ were in reality only
offering patients the possibility of ‘‘trading one disease for another.’’ This was not unlike the dilemma confronting cystic fibrosis physicians and patients as they weighed the tradeoffs between
fewer infections and the danger of antibacterial-resistant organisms, between fatal lung deterioration and a new life of medical
dependence as a lung transplantee. The BMT tradeoff in sickle
cell disease seemed particularly stark and tragic. As hematologist
Ernest Beutler summed it up, ‘‘Little would be gained by sickle
A Perilous Lottery for the Black Family: Sickle Cells [151]
cell disease patients if they merely traded the morbidity associated
with their primary disorder for a new set of disabling symptoms
resulting from their treatment.’’ 76
Despite the generally cautious appraisal of bone marrow transplantation, one subset of researchers embraced risk-taking and
bold forays into BMT experimentation. Among them was E. Donnall Thomas, awarded the Nobel Prize for his use of bone marrow
transplantation in treating leukemia, and a man who had faced
criticism early in his leukemia research for taking undue risks
with seriously ailing children. Not surprisingly, he spoke in favor
of risk-taking. ‘‘We heard an argument that a 10% mortality with
transplantation may not be acceptable,’’ he began. ‘‘On the other
hand,’’ he continued, ‘‘we have heard that the quality of the life
for sickle cell patients in many instances is perhaps worse than
death.’’ There was no simple answer to the conundrum. ‘‘This is
going to be a very subjective decision,’’ he conceded, yet the holding back of innovative therapies because they posed a risk was
deeply problematic. For Thomas, the goal of zero risk was unrealistic: ‘‘Some physicians would demand that marrow grafting have
almost a zero risk before it should be undertaken in sickle cell disease. I think that is an excessive requirement.’’ 77
The debate among experts over bone marrow transplantation
in sickle cell disease touched on such issues as what constituted
acceptable risk, but there was something deeply disturbing about
the broader context in which such choices would be made. Many
experts understood that one of the most troubling questions was
who would be making these choices. Who would be accepting the
terms of this life-and-death lottery? Nagel stated that ‘‘it is not
the physician but the patient who should be making the final decision.’’ But this was itself a troubled proposition, since ‘‘unfortunately, because the patient usually tends to be very young, this
decision will fall on the parent or guardian. The role of the physician . . . is to provide the most objective, dispassionate, and informed counseling in which the available data are presented in
clear terms, and with the appropriate caveats as to their applica[152] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
tion to individual cases.’’ 78 Leaving such decisions to parents or
guardians would not solve any problems. Nagel wondered about
the role socioeconomic circumstances might play in families’ decisions. Could desperate poverty influence their therapeutic decisions for the worse? ‘‘Is there not room for [parents] taking risk for
the wrong reasons? What if some parents or guardians decide on
marrow transplantation because they believe they cannot provide
appropriate support to their child for socioeconomic reasons?’’ 79
Such questions reveal yet again the fundamental connections
between sickle cell therapeutics and broader issues of social justice—connections that some SCD researchers had grown adept
at making. Indeed, for some observers the crucial question about
bone marrow transplantation was not how researchers weighed
the probabilities and statistics but rather the ethical and moral
problem of presenting this option in the first place to families
who were in disadvantaged social circumstances and who often
had trouble getting even basic care. The costs of a one-time fix
(even if successful) were weighed not only against the likelihood
of death and the long-term costs of caring for a child with GVHD,
but also against what an equivalent dollar amount would accomplish if put into comprehensive care and improving access to conventional SCD care. Where strong comprehensive care facilities
were lacking and where parents were frustrated about the costs of
long-term SCD care, could it be considered fair practice to offer
the lottery of BMT? Indeed, rather than pushing questions of justice and fairness into the background, BMT rather dramatically
accentuated concerns that had always surrounded SCD care.
The BMT option posed a variety of perplexing new ethical dilemmas as well. To what extent should professionals and experts
control these decisions, and to what extent should patients decide
for themselves? Should such choices be dictated by market forces
alone? These were ethical problems, to be sure, each carrying
a particular political resonance in the market-oriented, patientactivist context of the 1980s and 1990s. Questions about the purported virtue of the marketplace and the problem of regulation
A Perilous Lottery for the Black Family: Sickle Cells [153]
roiled American society throughout the 1980s and 1990s. Beginning with the deregulatory zeal of the Reagan era and continuing into the 1990s under President Clinton, these years witnessed
heated debate about the deregulation of scientific research. Did
regulation provide vital protection for research subjects, or was it
merely so much red tape standing in the way of progress?
For some, the controversy surrounding bone marrow transplantation was an extension of this larger discussion. In the late
1980s and early 1990s, for example, several researchers at the University of Chicago, a major transplantation center, apparently became frustrated by the ethical questions that, they believed, stood
in the way of bringing BMT to sickle cell patients and families.
Denied approval by their own institutional review board (IRB) to
conduct BMT trials for sickle cell disease, they sought an evidencebased solution: they turned to the market of potential consumers
—the families of children with SCD—and asked what they wanted
and what they thought constituted an acceptable risk. The idea
was to hand the decision over to families, to document their concerns, to study which kinds of families might opt for the risks of
BMT and which might not, and to use this knowledge to guide the
future use of BMT.
The Chicago researchers published their findings in the New
England Journal of Medicine, offering their study as a portrait of the
prospective consumers of bone marrow transplantation: a risktaking subset of families with SCD children. They found that ‘‘at
least 13 percent of parents might be expected to consent . . . given
current rates of morbidity and mortality,’’ and that these parents
did not harbor the same concerns as the university’s own cautious
IRB members. These risk-taking parents apparently ‘‘weighed the
risks and benefits of bone marrow transplantation . . . in a different way from members of our institutional review board.’’ Studying the demographic profile of these parents, the researchers
found revealing patterns. The families tended to have female children with SCD, and they tended to have attained higher levels of
[154] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
formal education. As the researchers noted, educational level mattered: ‘‘Parents who had graduated from high school were significantly more likely to accept some risk in exchange for cure than
those who were not high-school graduates.’’ And parents who remained at home with their children were less likely to embrace the
risk: ‘‘Parents who were employed or in school were more likely
to accept some risk than those who were not occupied outside the
home.’’ The findings seemed to suggest that BMT did not exploit
the desperation of the poor; rather, it appealed to better-off families with more formal education, those who had presumably come
to share the values and aspirations of the American middle-class
mainstream. Having identified these risk-taking families, the researchers argued that it was only natural for IRBs to remove the
ethical obstacles, allowing physicians and surgeons to target specific black families willing to accept the risk of BMT. They did not
address the gender question—why families with girls were more
inclined to roll the dice on BMT—which for some would itself
have raised profound ethical concerns. Nor did they discuss the
implications of tilting the practice toward privileged families willing to gamble with their sick children. Despite the researchers’
arguments, the question remained: Should medicine be offering
these kinds of odds and choices at all? Should such dangerous lifesustaining techniques be part of the American medical marketplace? 80
Researchers remained divided in the mid-1990s, and the experts held tightly on to the reins of decision making. As two Boston researchers noted in 1996, ‘‘Clinicians must now weigh the
pros and cons.’’ Bone marrow transplantation offered extraordinary health advantages, they added, for ‘‘a successful outcome
is definitive, and unless severe, chronic graft-versus-host disease
occurs, the procedure is curative.’’ But families also faced the possibility of crushing, permanent loss: ‘‘The potential for cure comes
at a considerable risk, most of which is incurred at the time of
the procedure.’’ Many doctors and researchers found themselves
A Perilous Lottery for the Black Family: Sickle Cells [155]
weighing these almost incalculable risks against the relative safety
of hydroxyurea therapy. HU was at least adequate for the ‘‘humble
goal’’ of reducing crises, and it ‘‘could be discontinued’’ if complications ever appeared.81 The same could not be said for bone
marrow transplantation.
Paralleling in some ways the debate over antibiotics, bone marrow transplantation posed a fiscal dilemma that futher complicated assessments of the procedure. Did the high short-term cost
(in dollars as well as lives lost) justify the potential long-term
gains for the few able and willing to gamble? As one Newsweek story
pointed out, ‘‘The transplant costs about $150,000 and is typically
covered by insurers [for those with health insurance coverage].’’
In contrast, ‘‘conventional treatment . . . runs roughly $30,000
to $50,000 a year and can only relieve symptoms.’’ 82 This kind
of calculation suggested that in sheer monetary terms, the transplant was a wise long-term investment. Charache, among others,
acknowledged that ‘‘over the lifetime of a . . . patient with moderately severe disease, medical expenses alone are several-fold
greater [under conventional care] than the cost of transplant.’’ Indeed, researchers on all sides agreed with Charache that ‘‘there is
no debate over the cost-efficacy of transplantation if the patient
has disease-free survival.’’ 83 Of course, patients with ‘‘diseasefree survival’’ constituted (through the 1990s) only a minority of
SCD patients on whom BMT was employed. In many ways this
was a false calculus for most SCD patients, one that reduced
losses and gains to mere money. The more important questions,
as many researchers in the SCD community were quick to note,
were social: Who would have access to HLA-matched donor marrow? Whose insurance would approve the procedure? And which
of this small percentage of SCD patients would survive the dangerous ‘‘experimental therapy’’ to benefit from the economic tradeoff ? 84 On the first question alone, Charache concluded that ‘‘in
the United States, only about 18% of [SCD] patients would be expected to have HLA-identical full siblings.’’ 85 In this therapeu[156] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
tic lottery, in other words, not everyone would be able to buy a
ticket.
between promise and peril
By the mid-1990s, the conversation about therapeutics and
revolutions in care in sickle cell disease had already endured dramatic ascents and descents along a troubling roller-coaster terrain. Amid the rush of new promises of genetic cures, many hematologists considered the promise as well as the perils of innovative
practice, the ethical conundrums of these therapeutic options,
and (most important) the ways in which these options intersected
with the lives of SCD patients and their families. Even if there was
not full agreement on the ethics of bone marrow transplantation,
the research community had developed an insightful ambivalence
about breakthroughs. What, they asked, did breakthroughs in care
really mean for patients?
Whether the topic was urea or hydroxyurea, pain management
or bone marrow transplantation, discussions about therapy for
sickle cell disease differed markedly in character and tone from
contemporary discussions about cystic fibrosis and Tay-Sachs disease. To be sure, many sickle cell researchers hailed BMT as a
curative breakthrough, yet even here the optimism was decidedly
muted. Ambivalence, skepticism, and caution abounded. Unlike
the CF ‘‘gene doctors’’ who came out of the subculture of research
entrepreneurism, most sickle cell researchers weighing the evidence on BMT had no financial stake in the outcome. On weighing all the evidence, most agreed that BMT remained too risky and
that ‘‘the search for other therapies not based on marrow transplantation should be continued.’’ 86 Those who sought to promote
BMT had to sidestep or argue away the ethical problems raised by
the innovative technique. Like those who championed gene therapy in CF, some in the SCD research community endorsed the idea
that innovation should be speedily brought to consumers and that
A Perilous Lottery for the Black Family: Sickle Cells [157]
the regulatory barriers to the use of BMT should be removed.87
But they were the minority in a culture in which patients, families, and practitioners had grown cautious yet hopeful about easy
promises of cure.
At the 1997 meeting of the Sickle Cell Anemia Disease Association, the Boston hematologist-oncologist David Nathan outlined the current state of therapies. He spoke about hydroxyurea
for pain management and blood transfusion, and only at the end
did his discussion turn to the prospect of ‘‘gene therapy.’’ At the
same time that other researchers hailed adenoviruses as tailormade vehicles for delivering genetic material to the lungs of cystic
fibrosis patients, no similarly simple experimental delivery system
had emerged for SCD gene therapy. A decade earlier, researchers
had promised that ‘‘the long-term goal of human gene therapy
for sickle cell disease’’ was in reach, and that the breakthrough
would merely consist of ‘‘constructing optimally safe and efficient
retroviral packaging lines as well as retroviral vectors containing
the human beta-globin gene.’’ The cure was close, they promised.
‘‘Success in treating disorders of human hemoglobin only awaits
additional technical advances for increasing the efficiency of gene
transfer and the level of gene expression.’’ 88 A decade later Nathan
acknowledged, ‘‘Of course we want to do gene therapy, but no one
has a gene therapy system that produces enough hemoglobin consistently.’’ 89 Among blood diseases, other disorders like hemophilia and Fanconi’s anemia seemed more likely targets for gene
therapy. Pessimistically, Nathan concluded that the likelihood of
gene therapy in SCD was remote; it was ‘‘possibly a dream.’’ A 1996
study found that ‘‘most of the work in gene therapy for singlegene inherited disease has focused on cystic fibrosis . . . , the most
common autosomal recessive disease in Caucasians in the United
States.’’ By the end of 1997, before gene therapy fell on truly hard
times, Nathan’s pessimism seemed to be another indicator of SCD
patients’ disadvantages. There were almost twenty gene therapy
clinical trials in cystic fibrosis but, not surprisingly, none in sickle
cell disease.90
[158] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
These diverse discussions about therapeutic futures reflected
different pasts and different cultural investments. Most notably,
the issue of community identity had long been part of the discussion of sickle cell disease. As with Tay-Sachs disease, discussions
about what constituted appropriate therapy for SCD were inseparable from cultural concerns—community self-determination,
cultural attitudes toward therapy, and socioeconomic status. By
contrast, with cystic fibrosis, the ‘‘Caucasian genetic disease,’’
issues of community identity were largely effaced under the vague
rubric of ‘‘whiteness,’’ which (as we argue in the previous chapter) suggested a more diffuse sense of belonging, without the
specific cultural meanings and stereotypes associated with Jewish or black identity in America. The purveyors of CF gene therapy
might allude to the whiteness of the disease, but their concern was
to sell the idea of gene therapy (the risky venture) in the broadest possible market. For them, the reference was more a rhetorical strategy than a response to patients, families, and community politics. For sickle cell researchers and physicians, the racial
experiences of patients have been considerably more than a convenient and vague allusion. For practitioners and patients, pain
and infection management, the unfulfilled dream of desickling
agents, and the gamble inherent in BMT were routinely racialized
—and made to resonate with social and political meanings. The
history of race and therapy played a vital role whenever physicians,
patients, and families considered the promise and the dangers of
unproven therapeutic innovation.
As the hematologist Hugh Chaplin wrote in his 2003 memoir,
bone marrow transplantation was merely the latest example of
‘‘unrealistic expectations and unnecessary heartbreak,’’ with extraordinary promise on one side and peril on the other.91 Hematologists have grappled with the false promises of unbridled optimism since before the age of genetic medicine. They have also
confronted a wide range of ethical, social, and economic questions surrounding diverse therapeutic options. In many respects,
that history was more than a dress rehearsal for the present; it was
A Perilous Lottery for the Black Family: Sickle Cells [159]
also an active part of an ongoing, evolving experience, shaping the
cautious evaluation of genetic medicine. Given this historical trajectory of race and medical innovation, there is every reason to believe that this experience will color assessments about the grand
possibility of genetic transformation for decades to come.
[160] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
conclusion
Dreams amid Diversity
From the rise of antibiotics to the advent of bone
marrow transplantation to the age of gene therapy, the promise of a coming therapeutic revolution has always had its allure.
‘‘Twenty years from now, gene therapy will have revolutionized
the practice of medicine,’’ promised W. French Anderson in 1996.
Francis Collins, head of the National Human Genome Project and
co-discoverer of the cystic fibrosis gene, also endorsed this perspective, saying in 1990 that research on CF ‘‘gives credence to the
idea that gene therapy will find a significant place in the therapeutic armamentarium.’’ 1 Such pronouncements captured much
about the cultural politics of the time. Boosters of genetic medicine seized upon a disease like CF because it sat at the intersection
of scientific discovery, business innovation, and medical practice.
For a time in the early 1990s the idea of CF gene therapy embodied
the hope of an imminent breakthrough in genetic medicine.
Why have such promises of breakthrough treatment played
out so differently from one disease to the next? The answer, it
seems, revolves around which America one inhabits. Vastly different situations, cultural sensibilities, and expectations have been at
work over the years, shaping the experiences of patients and shaping attitudes about particular diseases, about the people suffering
from them, and about the promise of medical breakthrough itself.
For some—notably, people with sickle cell disease—modern therapy has been a roller-coaster ride, a mix of significant gains and
unfulfilled hype. For others, frustration with incremental progress
has been a key motif. As we saw in the cystic fibrosis story, a
sense of frustrating progress could nurture a hope for imminent
breakthroughs, however unrealistic. And in Tay-Sachs disease, at-
titudes about inevitable decline and loss overshadowed conventional therapeutic expectations and shifted the focus toward innovations in prevention. These diverse attitudes about therapy have
been shaped by many factors: the disease experience itself, the
broader cultural image of the disorder, the efforts of physicians
and entrepreneurs to shape public thinking, and the ideals about
the groups (Jewish and African-American minority groups, majority Anglo-Americans) who became closely associated with each
disease. To be sure, the politics of race and ethnicity has been one
factor complicating the story of innovation.
selling the dream: race, ethnicity, and the
promise of genetic innovation
What should a multicultural society do when some in that society are willing to take measures to prevent the birth of people
with treatable diseases (like cystic fibrosis or sickle cell disease)
while others consider those measures extreme? As we saw in chapter 1, discussions about the prevention and potential cure of
Tay-Sachs disease impinged directly on questions of Jewish selfpreservation while also highlighting broader questions about minority status and genetic medicine in the United States. As more
and more diseases are traced to specific genes, and as more and
more Americans learn that they may carry the gene for one ailment
or another and may pass the malady on to their offspring, such dilemmas will become more common. And as several scholars have
observed, ‘‘The genetic revolution . . . will not benefit all equally,
and some may in fact be greatly disadvantaged by particular applications of genetic science.’’ 2 This problem was at the heart of
the debate over the Dor Yeshorim, that unique system of ‘‘genetic
matchmaking’’ that emerged among Ultra-Orthodox Jews in the
1980s to combat Tay-Sachs disease and sought in 1990s to extend
its program of testing and prevention to cystic fibrosis. ‘‘Every
single human being, you and me too, we have some genetic risks
[162] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
for our children,’’ geneticist Michael Kaback had commented in
1993, ‘‘whether it’s cancer, early heart disease, or certain types
of mental illness. I don’t know where this stops, or who makes
the decision where it stops.’’ 3 The comment reveals a quandary
in genetic medicine: Should limits be placed on how any group
might use genetic knowledge to preserve its distinctive identity
and the health of its people amid powerful pressures toward assimilation? This problem, which began as a health concern for
Ultra-Orthodox Jews, a tiny minority group in America, would reverberate beyond the boundaries of the synagogue and this insular
community.
The plans of the Dor Yeshorim’s architects conflicted with the
growing promise of gene therapy in cystic fibrosis, and in that tension we see another kind of cultural politics at work—one that extends well beyond the specifics of Ultra-Orthodox Jews in America
and points to deeper tensions between minority and majority sensibilities about religious faith, secular life, profit-making, and
hope for the future. The grand promise of cure was emerging out
of an enduring American faith in progress. It was a faith nurtured
by American mainstream culture and its powerful belief that high
risks would bring great rewards. From the origins of the nation
and indeed into the twenty-first century, these cultural commitments have been deeply informed by Anglo-American Protestant
sensibilities about capital accumulation, risk-taking, and the pursuit of profit. As Max Weber noted long ago, ‘‘In the United States,
the pursuit of wealth, stripped of its religious and ethical meaning, tends to become associated with purely mundane passions,
which often actually give it the character of sport.’’ 4 Faith in the
market is central to explaining why so many Americans—Jesse
Gelsinger among them—could buy into the exuberant therapeutic promises of gene therapy. Of course, many remained skeptical
of these promises as well. The culture of hype surrounding breakthrough cures is fundamentally American, and it reflects a kind of
faith that is deeply intertwined with American cultural ideals. Yet
Conclusion: Dreams amid Diversity [163]
the hype has evoked a range of different social responses. These
different responses—which are at the heart of this book—must
also be understood in cultural terms.
Why are some Americans skeptical of the promises—of high
risks, rapid rewards, and coming therapeutic breakthroughs—
while others are quick to invest in the gamble? The story of sickle
cell disease, and particularly the debate over pain management
and bone marrow transplantation, presents a disturbing portrait
of America, one in which basic health and social services are hard
to obtain, in which skepticism about the motives of patients is
rampant, and in which high-stakes gambles like BMT are promoted as remedies for a profoundly troubling situation. Over the
course of the last century, American sickle cell patients faced a
life of recurrent pain in a culture that was not only skeptical of
their suffering but also limited access to the drugs to alleviate
pain.5 Debates about the wisdom and ethics of promoting BMT in
sickle cell disease also flared up when its adherents insisted that
a 10 percent risk of mortality was acceptable. ‘‘Some physicians
would demand that marrow grafting have almost a zero risk before it should be undertaken in sickle cell disease,’’ wrote BMT
pioneer E. Donnall Thomas in 1991. ‘‘I think that is an excessive requirement.’’ 6 A troubling innovation for a painful chronic disease
prevalent among African Americans, BMT amounted to a highstakes lottery in which death and cure were both real options—a
metaphor for the cultural politics of ethnicity, race, and innovation in our time.
Over the decades many of these therapeutic dramas contained
obvious racial and ethnic narratives—stories of struggle, pain,
and survival, as in the case of sickle cell disease and Tay-Sachs.
In other cases (like that of cystic fibrosis), issues of race flared to
the surface only sporadically and unevenly over time. However, the
significance of the occasional appearance of race in discussions
about CF should not be underestimated. Even though it is often
invisible, the idea of whiteness remains a powerful force in American culture, able to be invoked from time to time to mobilize a
[164] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
wide array of public sentiments. When author Frank Deford explained in the early 1980s that CF was ‘‘the white version of sickle
cell disease,’’ he was pointing to the sense of black ownership that
had encircled SCD and was thereby calling for a larger amalgam
of ethnic groups spanning the American spectrum to align themselves with the majority cultural ideals and embrace CF as their
own malady.7 This small gesture showed, in the choice of a single
term, the ways in which whiteness itself (as well as ideas about
black and Jewish identity) could make use of disease symbolically,
to forge a unitary identity and to highlight difference from others.
The Dor Yeshorim’s plan for managing TSD and CF, the dilemma of bone marrow transplantation in SCD, and the rise and
fall of gene therapy in CF raise profound ethical and cultural
questions—a fact that the major actors in these dramas, from
Michael Kaback to Francis Collins to E. Donnall Thomas, have
acknowledged. How heavily should we rely on the profit motive
to shape the future of medicine and society? What level of risk
should come with new medicines, and who should bear those
risks? What limits should be placed on how individuals shape their
genetic destiny? Thus, in these unfolding stories of disease, the
pursuit of innovative therapies and drugs became microcosms of
broader cultural concerns. As scholar Carl Elliott has noted recently, questions about enhancement through medical treatments
reveal where American medicine meets the American dream.8
Perhaps the most troubling question is how to evaluate diverse
and often overblown claims about breakthrough medicine. Relentlessly marketed in the heyday of gene therapy was the promise
that medical science stood on the threshold of an era that would
soon produce dramatic lifesaving cures, if not a virtual elimination of disease. In 1993, for example, experts in the scientific
and lay press spoke glowingly of the possibilities: ‘‘Gene Therapy
on Newborn Sets Medical Precedent,’’ ‘‘Gene Therapy May Save
Kids,’’ ‘‘Heading off Genetic Diseases in their Infancy,’’ ‘‘A Cure of
Cystic Fibrosis? Rainbow [Children’s Hospital] Cheers New Gene
Therapy.’’ 9 It was a notion of imminent transformation buoyed
Conclusion: Dreams amid Diversity [165]
by a longstanding dream of scientific rationality; it was a powerful hope vaguely aligned with the general idea of progress; and it
was an ideal of medical and human development that gained increasing power in the late twentieth century. The dream of cure
has been deeply imbued with cultural values: hope for the future,
the power of capitalism to deliver better lives for its citizens,
the notion of an ever-unfolding modernity. The dream of genetic
medicine, ‘‘bottling the stuff of dreams,’’ has certainly been a part
of this larger ideal; and some of its more grandiose claims are not
far removed from the unrealistic idea that someday, in the nottoo-distant future, there will be no disease at all.10 Seldom have
these powerful ideals been scrutinized. From time to time, a few
notes of caution might appear in the headlines: ‘‘Genetic Research
Escalates—But Locating Flaws Can Be a Long Way from Curing
Disease,’’ noted one Seattle newspaper. The London Guardian suggested that ominous shadow loomed around genetic innovation:
‘‘Code of Conduct: The So-Called Homosexual Gene Highlights
the Dramatic Advance in DNA Research. It Can Save Lives and
Alleviate Suffering but It Also Poses Huge Ethical Problems.’’ 11
But even with these cautions, the media reveled in the possibilities
of transformation and the likelihood that ‘‘inherited diseases like
sickle cell anemia and hemophilia might be cured in newborns . . .
while adult diseases like cancer and AIDS’’ might be next in line to
benefit.12 In the history of disease—and, as we have seen, in the
histories of TSD, CF, and SCD—this vision of standing ‘‘on the
threshold’’ has emerged repeatedly, nurtured by innovators and
entrepreneurs and intertwined with the hopes, ideals, and fears
of different patient groups and medical communities in ways that
are uplifting but also deeply troubling.
The dream of imminent transformation is an integral part of
the ideology of the modern medical sciences, of which genetic
medicine is a part. There is ample evidence in the history of medicine—for example, in the role of insulin and penicillin in diabetes or in the preventive power of the polio vaccine—to suggest
that this dream is both rational and legitimate. Unquestionably,
[166] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
the story of insulin’s discovery in the 1920s, its extensive manufacture, and its role in saving the lives of countless patients with
diabetes speaks volumes about the dream. Yet the advent of insulin and the polio vaccine also took many decades to play out; and,
more important, the actual impact of these breakthroughs on disease and society has been multifaceted. As historian Chris Feudtner has shown, breakthroughs in diabetes care (from insulin in
the 1920s to penicillin in the 1940s) allowed patients to live longer,
but it also created an entirely new category of person: a chronic
diabetes patient who would come to develop long-term complications from life with the disease. Later breakthroughs such as
kidney dialysis would address some of these complications, and
new questions would emerge about who would cover the costs
of these expensive therapeutic interventions. The scientific transmutation of diabetes has made the disease far more prevalent
than it was one hundred years ago, and since the 1970s the advent of legislation mandating Medicare payment for dialysis for
people with end-stage renal disease (many of them diabetics) has
transformed the story of scientific innovation into a story of social justice.13 Once it was established, this new federal entitlement
prompted new questions about the extent to which society should
cover the costs of putting innovative care within the reach of all
its citizens. Viewed through the historical lens, then, the dream of
breakthroughs becomes more socially complex—for transforming dream into lived reality involves political negotiations, competition for resources, and investments of many kinds.
The recent histories of Tay-Sachs disease, cystic fibrosis, and
sickle cell disease unearth often hidden dimensions of the promise of breakthrough medicine: the conflict between the cultural
allure of the idea of imminent transformation and the realities of
what can be delivered to patients; the unintended consequences of
experimentation and innovation; and the ways in which scientists,
business interests, and social commentators capitalize on this
cultural motif in order to draw attention to their respective enterprises, even when their ventures are speculative in the extreme.
Conclusion: Dreams amid Diversity [167]
It remains to be seen what kind of future the genetics revolution holds for us. To date, the revolution has most transformed society in the areas of diagnosis and prevention. Therapy continues
to be a vexing challenge. If the promise of breakthrough cures
has often been unrealized, a large part of the problem is rooted
in the stubborn asymmetries between scientific and technological
models of disease and how bodies actually work. The idea of an
adenovirus that transports ‘‘good’’ DNA to the cells in a patient’s
lungs which then repairs the functioning of the diseased cells is
both elegant and naïve. On one hand, there remains something
alluring in this simple dream of curing disease, precisely because
the dream so radically oversimplifies or stereotypes the complexities of the body itself. On the other hand, the human body is complex and has shown resistance over the years to simplistic manipulation. The logic of the adenovirus as a DNA delivery vehicle
did not account for the realities of inflammation that would be
caused by the vector. The logic of enzyme replacement did not,
at first, reckon on the blood-brain barrier as a powerful impediment. And the logic of bone marrow transplantation, as presented
in the headlines, rarely took note of the realities of graft-versushost-disease. The popular dream of breakthrough medicine seldom dwells on such problems; such worrisome matters do not
make the headlines, for they do not capture the public or scientific imagination. Nonetheless, these problems represent the true
face of breakthrough medicine, in all its paradoxical wonder and
its social and ethical complexity.
The dream of breakthrough medicine often founders when
confronted with another asymmetry: between the scientific logic
of producing new therapies and the social logic of how the marketplace determines who gains access to those innovations.
Throughout the 1990s it became increasingly clear that genetic
medicine was not merely a benevolent enterprise dedicated to curing the sick people of the world but also a growing financial enterprise operating according to the edicts of the marketplace. Headlines, once again, told the story: ‘‘Worcester Firm a Step Closer
[168] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
to Finding a Gene Therapy: Emerging Business,’’ ‘‘A Market That
Could Spiral: The Commercial Opportunities of Gene Therapy
Are Growing by the Minute,’’ and ‘‘Biotech Startup Gets Genentech’s Backing: South [San Francisco] Firm to Take 20% Stake in
[Gene Therapy Company] GenVec.’’ 14 Clinical experiments were
means toward a financial end; one such end was attracting investors with a steady stream of good news, bringing a promising
product ever-closer to the market. In this sense the promise of genetic medicine took many of its meanings from the broader business culture of the 1990s and from the strategizing of a new type
of researcher/entrepreneur, which was further blurring the lines
between innovation for profit and patient care. Not surprisingly,
the failures of gene therapy in later years would draw increasing public attention to this profit-seeking aspect of the enterprise
and to the ways in which ostensibly benevolent experiments were
shaped, clouded, and compromised by the search for profit. But
even had it been a success, and had the promised cures emerged
from the research process as in the story of Gaucher’s disease and
enzyme replacement therapy, these same forces would have continued to shape the cost and accessibility of innovative treatments.
In their efforts to convince others of the far-reaching value of
medical innovations like gene therapy, those selling the dream
insisted that the ripples of innovation would span the nation—
that is, the benefits would accrue to a wide range of racial and
ethnic groups. As one article suggested in the 1990s, ‘‘Gene therapy offers promise in future for sickle cell anemia,’’ while others
repeatedly noted that cystic fibrosis was the most common genetic
disease among Caucasians.15 Such references were never accidental. Society places a great deal of stock in what scientists tell us
about race and ethnicity, looking to these experts to tell us about
the biological bases of our cultural differences. Genetic analysis
and population studies of Tay-Sachs disease, for example, told the
story of its links to Ashkenazic Jewish populations and also to
populations like French Canadians and Louisiana Cajuns. Sickle
cell disease taught about its links to malaria and African survival.
Conclusion: Dreams amid Diversity [169]
The notion of cystic fibrosis as an important Caucasian disease became the focus of wide-ranging speculation about European and
Caucasian history and identity, for the CF gene seemed to span
eons from the age of early man to the present.16 In the 1990s,
studies of the DF508 gene, the most common among the more
than two hundred mutations responsible for CF, became a key reference point for speculation and myth-making about European
identity.
Despite the apparent links between disease and racial identity,
the specifics of these links proved to be malleable and subject
to change. Indeed, the idea of ‘‘race’’ carried strikingly different
meanings in each disease. For example, as we saw in chapter 2,
when one cystic fibrosis expert was faced with the need to lobby
Congress for research funds in 1972, at a time when ‘‘white’’ diseases might not have gained a sympathetic hearing, he comfortably asserted the panethnic nature of CF. When researchers in the
1990s spoke of CF as a ‘‘white’’ disease, they were also attempting to evoke a set of shared cultural assumptions—not about panethnicity but about the particular benefits that might accrue from
genetic innovation for that majority of Americans who identified
themselves as white. Such diseases—from Tay-Sachs to sickle cell
disease to cystic fibrosis—could be called upon at various times
to do a kind of cultural heavy lifting, to signal the broad scope and
significance of scientific work, to ensure cultural and financial investments in a promising scientific and medical enterprise.
By the late 1990s and into the first years of the twenty-first
century, the gene therapy news had taken a turn for the worse.
Again, the headlines in 2004 told of new problems with the dream:
‘‘FDA Suspends Gene Therapy Work,’’ ‘‘Why Gene Therapy Still
Hasn’t Produced Major Breakthroughs,’’ ‘‘Gene Genie Stays in
Bottle,’’ ‘‘Gene Therapy Is Just an Expensive Myth, Claims Scientist.’’ 17 The enterprise deflated precipitously beginning in the late
1990s, its promise sapped by experimental failures, by the deaths
of patients, by new concerns about cancer risk, and by the bursting
of the inflated biotechnology bubble. Yet if the dream of curative
[170] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
gene therapy appears out of reach, the allure of genetic medicine
remains strong.
‘‘the king is dead, long live the king’’:
from gene therapy to pharmacogenomics
At precisely the time when gene therapy was being declared
moribund, a new promise was emerging: the dream of pharmacogenomics, the idea of targeting drugs to the specific genetic
makeup of patients in order to deliver cures that more precisely
matched the workings of their individual bodies. As so often happens in medicine, in late 2004 an old drug resurfaced with novel
uses. Five years earlier the Food and Drug Administration had
rejected the drug BiDil for use in the ‘‘general population,’’ but
the company producing the drug sought and received permission
from the FDA in 2001 to test the drug in African-American heartfailure patients.
The story of BiDil evoked many of the themes that shadowed
the therapeutic histories of Tay-Sachs disease, cystic fibrosis,
and sickle cell disease: the roller-coaster ride of therapy, the tensions between faith in breakthroughs and skepticism about grand
promises. In this second round of clinical trials, BiDil proved
effective for treating heart failure in roughly one thousand African Americans, whose heart disease tended to be more severe than
that found in the ‘‘general,’’ predominantly white, population of
patients with heart disease. Trials were immediately halted, the
drug was declared a success, and media accounts voiced both wonder and skepticism about the findings. One journalist asked, ‘‘Is it
good science—or shrewd marketing?’’ No one could reliably say
why the drug had worked in this study or whether race and ethnicity were indeed key factors in the its effectiveness; and although
there was no effort to study the genes or genetic features of the
patients per se, the story was quickly framed as ‘‘the leading edge
of race-based pharmacogenomics.’’ 18 The story sent a diverse
range of biological and economic messages. As Jonathan Katz reConclusion: Dreams amid Diversity [171]
marked, ‘‘BiDil became an ethnic drug through the interventions
of law and commerce as much as through medical understanding
of biological differences that correlate with racial groups.’’ 19 Indeed, from the start of the clinical trial the Massachusetts-based
company, NitroMed, argued that the drug’s ability to remedy
nitric-oxide deficiency (which NitroMed argued was more common in black heart-failure patients than in others) ‘‘might make
it especially suited’’ for black patients.20 The company’s president
and chief executive, Dr. Loberg, noted that the market for the drug
was quite large since ‘‘there were about 750,000 blacks with heart
failure . . . and if all of them used the drug, sales could reach $1 billion a year.’’ 21
Beneath the catchy and simplistic headlines suggesting that
this was an instance in which genetics, disease, race, and ethnicity came together, a much more complicated story emerged; indeed, many different and conflicted notions about race biology remained unreconciled in the BiDil story. ‘‘What we’re talking about
is a selective prevalence of the mechanism,’’ said Dr. Anne Taylor, the lead researcher in the clinical trial. ‘‘It doesn’t mean that
every member of that group possesses this mechanism [of drug
action].’’ Or, as another physician put it, ‘‘It doesn’t mean that
it’s unique to that group.’’ 22 Much of the controversy surrounding
‘‘the black pill’’ revolved around the question of who benefits and
profits from this kind of targeted research and marketing. One
cardiologist worried that ‘‘approving and marketing a drug to one
group only could hurt other patients who might have benefited
from the same treatment.’’ 23 Another commentator turned this
line of inquiry back onto the socially constructed nature of ‘‘blackness’’ itself, asking, ‘‘Does the drug work more effectively on
dark-skinned blacks than light-skinned, vanilla-colored vs. caramel, deep-chocolate-colored vs. high yellow? What level of black
blood, DNA or gradation of complexion must African Americans have to be good candidates to receive the drug and have it
work effectively?’’ 24 Still another observer, reaching for compromise, noted, ‘‘We need not shy away from the potential benefits of
[172] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
race-conscious therapeutics, but we should manage its downside
risks.’’ What was needed was ‘‘greater awareness among physicians and the public that race is at best a placeholder for other
predispositions, and not a biologic verity.’’ 25 Such questions highlighted, of course, the intense skepticism greeting the BiDil claims
as well as the complex matrix of attitudes about skin color, racial
identity, fairness, and marketing hype that have historically shadowed discussions about race, genetics, and medicine.
That one promise of genetic breakthrough should emerge just
as another is collapsing should not surprise us. Maintaining faith
in innovation, especially amid controversy, is a complex cultural
process that resembles other patterns for shoring up hope, trust,
and faith in authority. In former times, and still today, the sovereignty of the king was assured by his two bodies: one corporeal, the other symbolic. His corporeal body might expire, but the
king never perished, for he was always to be replaced by another.
Thus was the principle of succession supported, assuring order in
times of crisis. In the age of modern biomedicine, the authority
of therapeutic innovation depends in no small part on a similar
logic of succession: a powerful cultural belief in the sick body’s
capacity to be transformed by the reigning cure of the day, if not
through gene therapy, as promised in the 1990s, then through
pharmacogenomics in the years to come. Indeed, as we have seen
in the stories of Tay-Sachs disease, cystic fibrosis, and sickle cell
disease, this pattern is part of the long and fascinating history
of therapeutic promises and genetic developments. It is a recurring theme of the past half-century: when one breakthrough fails
to play out as predicted or has unwelcome consequences, another
will emerge to take its place or to resolve the mess created in the
wake.
Nor should it surprise us that questions of race and ethnicity
are so often at the forefront of breakthrough medicine. For researchers and reporters alike, the act of linking race to stories of
innovation dramatizes and broadens the cultural significance of
the innovation. In this context, grand claims about the future
Conclusion: Dreams amid Diversity [173]
of therapy can easily segue into a different set of discussions—
about justice, fairness, the pursuit of equality, self-determination,
and the effort to nurture and maintain identity in modern America. These issues, we argue, are often obscured by the headlines,
by the hype associated with breakthrough medicine. Beneath the
headlines lies a more complex story, a story about suffering and
faith, about unevenness in the distribution of risks and rewards,
about the marketing of dreams, about how diverse Americans embrace innovation, and about how each of us grapples in our own
way with the promise of a better life to come.
[174] The Troubled Dream of Genetic Medicine
notes
introduction. ethnic symbols in conflicted times
1 The interaction between race, ethnicity, and innovation spawned many
controversies over the years. A complete list would be too long to provide here. Some of the most prominent examples include the Tuskegee
experiment on the impact of untreated syphilis in African-American
Southern men dating from the 1930s to the early 1970s; Nazi-era experimentation on Jews, Gypsies, and others; the field trials testing the
birth control pill in Puerto Rico beginning in the mid-1950s; the development and testing of AIDS drugs and vaccines in the developing
world; and the recent history of the Human Genome Diversity Project.
For more on these topics, see James Jones, Bad Blood: The Tuskegee Syphilis
Experiment (New York: Free Press, 1981); Annette Ramirez and Conrad
Seipp, Colonialism, Catholicism, and Contraception (Chapel Hill: University
of North Carolina Press, 1983); Benno Muller-Hill, Murderous Science:
Elimination by Scientific Selection of Jews, Gypsies, and Others, Germany, 1933–
1945, trans. G. Fraser (Cold Spring Harbor: Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press, 1998); Nicolas Nattrass, The Moral Economy of AIDS in South
Africa (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2003); and Jenny Reardon, Race to the Finish: Identity and Governance in the Age of Genomics (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2004). See also S. J. Gould, The Mismeasure of Man (New York: W. W. Norton, 1981).
2 David Suzuki and Peter Knudtson, Genethics: The Clash between the New
Genetics and Human Values (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press,
1989); Philip Kitcher, The Lives to Come: The Genetic Revolution and Human
Possibilities (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1996); Daniel Kevles and
Leroy Hood, eds., The Code of Codes: Scientific and Social Issues in the Human
Genome Project (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1992); and
the essays in Timothy Murphy and Marc Lappe, eds., Justice and the
Human Genome Project (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1994), in particular Arthur Caplan, ‘‘Handle with Care: Race,
Class and Genetics,’’ Norman Daniels, ‘‘The Genome Project, Individual Difference, and Just Health Care,’’ Leonard Fleck, ‘‘Just Genetics: A Problem Agenda,’’ and Marc Lappe, ‘‘Justice and the Limitations
of Genetic Knowledge.’’
3 Lawrence Fisher, ‘‘Bottling the Stuff of Dreams: Gains in Gene Therapy
Encourage the Industry,’’ New York Times, 1 June 1995, D1; Robert Schulman et al., ‘‘The Gene Doctors: Scientists Are on the Verge of Curing
Life’s Cruelest Diseases,’’ Business Week, 18 November 1985, 76–80.
4 The scholarly literature on the social and cultural aspects of genetic
disease, genetic medicine (screening, therapy, and risks), and public
perceptions of genetics has grown dramatically in recent years, and
includes works by anthropologists, sociologists, historians, and philosophers. See, for example, M. Susan Lindee, Moments of Truth in Genetic Medicine (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2005); Troy
Duster, Backdoor to Eugenics, 2d ed. (New York: Routledge, 2003); Jenny
Reardon, Race to the Finish: Identity and Governance in the Age of Genomics
(Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2005); Paul Rabinow, French
DNA: Trouble in Purgatory (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1999);
Paul Martin, ‘‘Genes as Drugs: The Social Shaping of Gene Therapy and
the Reconstruction of Genetic Disease,’’ Sociology of Health and Illness 21
(1999): 517–38; Alan Stockdale, ‘‘Waiting for the Cure: Mapping the
Social Relations of Human Gene Therapy Research,’’ Sociology of Health
and Illness 21 (1999): 579–96; Dorothy Nelkin and M. Susan Lindee,
The DNA Mystique: The Gene as Cultural Icon (New York: W. H. Freeman,
1995); Celeste Michelle Condit, The Meanings of the Gene: Public Debates
about Human Heredity (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1999);
Michael Ruse, ‘‘Does Genetic Counselling Really Raise the Quality of
Life?’’ in Is Science Sexist? and Other Problems in the Biomedical Sciences (Boston: D. Reidel, 1981), 130–57; Rayna Rapp, Testing Women, Testing the
Fetus: The Social Impact of Amniocentesis in America (New York: Routledge,
1999); Rayna Rapp, ‘‘Risky Business: Genetic Counseling in a Shifting
World,’’ in Articulating Hidden Histories, ed. Jane Schneider and Rayna
Rapp (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1995),
175–89; Carlos Novas and Nikolas Rose, ‘‘Genetic Risk and the Birth
of the Somatic Individual,’’ Economy and Society 29 (November 2000):
485–513; Kaja Finkler, ‘‘Illusions of Controlling the Future: Risk and
Genetic Inheritance,’’ Anthropology and Medicine 10 (2003): 51–70; and
Karen-Sue Taussig, Rayna Rapp, and Deborah Heath, ‘‘Flexible Eugenics: Technologies of the Self in the Age of Genetics,’’ in Genetic
Nature/Culture: Anthropology and Science beyond the Two-Culture Divide, ed.
Alan H. Goodman, Deborah Heath, and M. Susan Lindee (Berkeley and
Los Angeles: University of California Press, 2003), 51–76. On medi[176] Notes to Pages 2–3
cal genetics and religious, ethnic, and national identity, see Karen-Sue
Taussig, ‘‘Calvinism and Chromosomes: Religion, the Geographical
Imaginary, and Medical Genetics in the Netherlands,’’ Science as Culture
6 (1997): 495–524, and Susan Martha Kahn, Reproducing Jews: A Cultural
Account of Assisted Conception in Israel (Durham: Duke University Press,
2000).
The literature on the cultural and social aspects of Tay-Sachs disease, cystic fibrosis, and sickle cell disease is also significant. For historical comparisons of the three disorders, see Howard Markel, ‘‘Scientific Advances and Social Risks: Historical Perspectives of Genetic
Screening Programs for Sickle Cell Disease, Tay-Sachs Disease, Neural Tube Defects, and Down Syndrome, 1970–1997,’’ in Promoting Safe
and Effective Genetic Testing in the United States: Final Report of the Task Force
on Genetic Testing, ed. Neil Holtzman and Michael Watson (Baltimore:
Johns Hopkins University Press, 1998), 161–76, and Keith Wailoo, ‘‘Inventing the Heterozygote: Molecular Biology, Racial Identity, and the
Narratives of Sickle-Cell Disease, Tay-Sachs, and Cystic Fibrosis,’’ in
Race, Nature, and the Politics of Difference, ed. Donald Moore, Jake Kosek,
and Anand Pandian (Durham: Duke University Press, 2003), 235–53.
On cystic fibrosis, see Lene Koch and Dirk Stemerding, ‘‘The Sociology
of Entrenchment—A Cystic Fibrosis Test for Everyone,’’ Social Science
and Medicine 39 (1994): 1211–20; Alan Stockdale, ‘‘Conflicting Perspectives: Coping with Cystic Fibrosis in the Age of Molecular Medicine,’’
Ph.D. diss., Brandeis University, 1997; Anne Kerr, ‘‘(Re)Constructing
Genetic Disease: The Clinical Continuum between Cystic Fibrosis and
Male Infertility,’’ Social Studies of Science 30 (2000): 847–94; and Adam M.
Hedgecoe, ‘‘Expansion and Uncertainty: Cystic Fibrosis, Classification
and Genetics,’’ Sociology of Health and Illness 25 (January 2003): 50–
70. On sickle cell disease, see Keith Wailoo, Drawing Blood: Technology
and Disease Identity in Twentieth-Century America (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1997); Melbourne Tapper, In the Blood: Sickle Cell
Anemia and the Politics of Race (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania
Press, 1999); Keith Wailoo, Dying in the City of the Blues: Sickle Cell Anemia
and the Politics of Race (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press,
2001); Duana Fullwiley, ‘‘Life, Ethics, and Sickle Cell Anemia: A Single
Gene Disorder in a Contingent World,’’ Ph.D. diss., University of California Berkeley/University of California San Francisco, 2002; Duana
Fullwiley, ‘‘Discriminate Biopower and Everyday Biopolitics: Views on
Note to Page 3 [177]
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
Sickle Cell Testing in Dakar,’’ Medical Anthropology 23 (April/June 2004):
157–95; and Carolyn Moxley Rouse, ‘‘Paradigms and Politics: Shaping Health Care Access for Sickle Cell Patients through the Discursive
Regimes of Biomedicine,’’ Culture, Medicine, and Psychiatry 28 (2004):
369–99.
Linus Pauling, ‘‘Reflections on a New Biology: Foreword,’’ UCLA Law
Review 15 (1968): 269; Gina Kolata, ‘‘Nightmare or the Dream of a New
Era in Genetics?’’ New York Times, 7 December 1993, A1.
Ellen Lee, ‘‘On the Front Lines against Cystic Fibrosis,’’ Atlanta Journal
and Constitution, 23 August 1998, C4. Also Michael Kernan, ‘‘A Death in
the Family: Frank Deford’s Poignant Goodbye to His Daughter,’’ Washington Post, 27 October 1983, D1.
TSD, CF, and SCD are all autosomal recessive traits, which means that
they each result from the inheritance of two defective traits (or genes),
one from each parent. Thus, when both parents are carriers of the
faulty genetic trait, any child they conceive has a 25 percent chance of
being free of the trait, a 50 percent chance of inheriting the trait, and
a 25 percent chance of inheriting the disease itself (a double dose of
the trait).
Madeleine Goodman and Lenn Goodman, ‘‘The Overselling of Genetic
Anxiety,’’ Hastings Center Report, October 1982, 20–27.
Particularly useful studies of these three childhood diseases (and child
health in general) include Frank Deford, Alex: The Life of a Child (New
York: Viking, 1983); Sydney Halpern, American Pediatrics: The Social Dynamics of Professionalism, 1880–1980 (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1988); Suffer the Children: The Story of Thalidomide
(New York: Viking Press, 1979); Stuart Edelstein, The Sickled Cell: From
Myths to Molecules (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1986);
Bruce Shapiro and Ralph Heussner, A Parent’s Guide to Cystic Fibrosis (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1991); and Michael Kaback,
ed., Tay-Sachs Disease: Screening and Prevention (New York: Alan R. Liss,
1977).
Hugh Chaplin, Lenabell: A Doctor’s Memoir of a Remarkable Woman’s Eighty
Year Battle with Sickle Cell Disease (Philadelphia: Xlibris, 2003); Andrew
Purvis, ‘‘Laying Siege to a Deadly Gene: Thanks to Series of Breakthroughs, Doctors Are Closing in on a Cure for Cystic Fibrosis,’’ Time,
24 February 1992, 60.
Barbara Culliton, ‘‘Cooley’s Anemia: Special Treatment for Another
[178] Notes to Pages 3–6
12
13
14
15
16
Ethnic Disease,’’ Science 178 (10 November 1972): 590–93; Kernan, ‘‘A
Death in the Family,’’ D1.
Herbert J. Gans, ‘‘Symbolic Ethnicity: The Future of Ethnic Groups
and Cultures in America,’’ in On the Making of Americans: Essays in Honor
of David Riesman, ed. Herbert Gans et al. (Philadelphia: University of
Pennsylvania Press, 1979), 193; reprinted in Werner Sollors, ed., Theories of Ethnicity: A Classical Reader (Washington Square, N.Y.: New York
University Press, 1996), 425.
On one hand, modern genetic information about diseases like TSD,
CF, and SCD have reinforced ideas about fundamental biological differences. On the other hand, believers in the new genetics insist that
these differences are not real—that careful and thorough study of the
role of a wider range of genes across human populations will eventually force a radical rethinking of time-worn notions of race, ethnicity,
and group identity. They argue that the distribution of genes across
populations will reveal profound linkages across groups, suggesting
that medicine will take its future cues from our genes rather than from
our skin color or ethnic affiliations. In this new world, it is said, we
may come to see that genetic risks carried by any single individual may
make that person closer kin with another individual carrying those
same genetic risks, regardless of their race or ethnicity. A new biological reality may well come to supplant the older one, at least in the
realm of scientific research and medicine. This is one perspective on
race, biology, and identity taking shape today, for example, in the new
field of pharmacogenomics.
Diane Paul, ‘‘Eugenic Origins of Medical Genetics,’’ in The Politics of
Heredity: Essays on Eugenics, Biomedicine, and the Nature-Nurture Debate (Albany: SUNY Press, 1998), 149, quoting Frederick Osborn, The Future of
Human Heredity (New York: Harper and Brothers, 1968), 25.
Richard Lewontin, Biology as Ideology: The Doctrine of DNA (New York:
Perennial, 1993); Edward Yoxen, ‘‘Constructing Genetic Diseases,’’ in
The Problem of Medical Knowledge: Examining the Social Construction of Medicine, ed. P. Wright and A. Treacher (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University
Press, 1982), 144–61; Richard Lewontin, It Ain’t Necessarily So: The Dream
of the Human Genome and Other Illusions (New York: New York Review of
Books, 2001); Troy Duster, Backdoor to Eugenics (New York: Routledge,
1990).
Joseph Graves, The Emperor’s New Clothes: Biological Theories of Race at the
Notes to Pages 6–8 [179]
Millennium (New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 2003); Jonathan
Marks, Human Biodiversity: Genes, Race, and History (New York: Aldine,
1995); Steve Olsen, Mapping Human History: Genes, Race, and Our Common
Origins (New York: Mariner Books, 2003). Also Karen Brodkin, How Jews
Became White Folks and What That Says about Race in America (New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 1998); Ruth Frankenberg, White Women,
Race Matters: The Social Construction of Whiteness (Minneapolis: University
of Minnesota Press, 1993).
17 Various scholars have pointed out the fabricated nature of Caucasian
as a racial concept. As English biologist Thomas Henry Huxley wrote in
1868, ‘‘Of all the odd myths that have arisen in the scientific world, the
‘Caucasian mystery’ invented quite innocently by [Johann Friedrich]
Blumenbach [in 1775] is the oddest. A Georgian woman’s skull was the
handsomest in his collection. Hence it became his model exemplar of
human skulls, from which all the others might be regarded as deviations; and out of this, by some strange intellectual hocus-pocus, grew
up the notion that the Caucasian man is the prototypic ‘Adamic’ man.’’
After Huxley wrote, the term Caucasian became associated with the origins of the Anglo-Saxon and Aryan races on similarly mythic grounds.
Since World War II, the term Caucasian has been most frequently used
as a synonym for white. At every stage in its history, the concept of
‘‘Caucasian’’ has been convoluted and problematic. See Matthew Frye
Jacobsen, Whiteness of a Different Color: European Immigrants and the Alchemy
of Race (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1998), 1–14, Huxley quotation at 1.
18 Nor should this book be seen as an effort to track the epidemiological
history of these maladies—to follow their rising and falling prevalence
over time. To be sure, SCD and CF appear to have grown in prevalence
over the last half century, while in the last few decades occurrences
of TSD—a much rarer disease than the other two—have diminished.
SCD is said to occur in 1 in every 400 births to African-American parents; CF is said to occur at a similar rate among white Americans; and
TSD has a recorded incidence of 1 per 3,600 births to Ashkenazic Jewish parents. (See also the information on pp. 27, 92, and 133 for carrier frequency and disease incidence.) While the following pages give
some insight into shifts in these figures over time, a full epidemiological portrait is well beyond the scope of this book. Indeed, such a
history would require the analysis of health statistics that are incom[180] Notes to Pages 9–10
plete. Moreover, disease like CF and SCD were widely seen as ‘‘great
masqueraders’’ in the 1950s and 1960s, often evading diagnosis simply
because they mimicked so many other diseases. Any attempt to reconstruct an epidemiological history would fail, given dramatic historical
shifts in the identification of such maladies.
19 Crystal quoted in Natalie Angier, ‘‘Cystic Fibrosis: Experiment Hits a
Snag,’’ New York Times, 22 September 1993, C12; ‘‘Waking up Genes:
A Flavor Enhancer May Provide the First Treatment for Sickle Cell Anemia,’’ Time, 25 January 1993, 23.
20 Steven Epstein, Impure Science: AIDS, Activism, and the Politics of Knowledge (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1998);
Laura K. Potts, ed., Ideology of Breast Cancer: Feminist Perspectives (New
York: Palgrave, 2000); Anne S. Kasper and Susan Ferguson, eds., Breast
Cancer: Society Shapes an Epidemic (New York: St. Martin’s, 2000).
21 The growing influence of genetics has already altered community and
family relationships and profoundly influenced our ideas about kinship—a process anthropologist Kaja Finkler calls ‘‘the medicalization
of kinship.’’ Kaja Finkler, Experiencing the New Genetics: Family and Kinship
on the Medical Frontier (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press,
2000). See also Alice Wexler, Mapping Fate: A Memoir of Family, Risk, and
Genetic Research (New York: Random House, 1995); Rayna Rapp, ‘‘Extra
Chromosomes and Blue Tulips: Medico-Familial Interpretations,’’ in
Living and Working with the New Medical Technologies, ed. Margaret Lock,
Allan Young, Alberto Cambrosio, and Alan Harwood (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2000), 184–208; Kaja Finkler, ‘‘The Kin in
the Gene [with Commentaries],’’ Current Anthropology 42 (2001): 235–
63; Rayna Rapp, Deborah Heath, and Karen-Sue Taussig, ‘‘Genealogical Dis-Ease: Where Hereditary Abnormality, Biomedical Explanation,
and Family Responsibility Meet,’’ in Relative Values: Reconfiguring Kinship
Studies, ed. Sarah Franklin and Susan McKinnon (Durham: Duke University Press, 2001), 384–409; Rayna Rapp, ‘‘Cell Life and Death, Child
Life and Death: Genomic Horizons, Genetic Diseases, Family Stories,’’
in Remaking Life and Death: Toward an Anthropology of the Biosciences, ed.
Sarah Franklin and Margaret Lock (Santa Fe: School of American Research Press, 2003), 129–64; and Kaja Finkler, Cécile Skrzynia, and
James P. Evans, ‘‘The New Genetics and Its Consequences for Family,
Kinship, Medicine, and Medical Genetics,’’ Social Science and Medicine 57
(August 2003): 403–12.
Notes to Pages 12–13 [181]
chapter 1. eradicating a ‘‘jewish gene’’
1 Jane Feldman Paritzky, ‘‘Tay-Sachs: The Dreaded Inheritance,’’ American Journal of Nursing, March 1985, 262–63.
2 ‘‘Denouement and Discussion: Tay Sachs Disease,’’ American Journal of
the Diseases of Children 146 (June 1992): 768.
3 As Horace Kellen wrote in 1915, ‘‘And finally the Jews. Their attitude
toward America is different in a fundamental respect from that of other
immigrant nationalities. They do not come to the United States from
truly native lands . . . They come from lands of sojourn where they have
been for ages treated as foreigners . . . Yet, once . . . the Jewish immigrant takes his place in our society a free man and an American, he
tends to become all the more a Jew.’’ Horace Kellen, ‘‘Democracy versus the Melting Pot: A Study of American Nationality,’’ Nation, 18 February 1915, 190–94, and 25 February 1915, 217–20, reprinted in Werner
Sollors, ed., Theories of Ethnicity: A Classical Reader (Washington Square,
N.Y.: New York University Press, 1996), 67–92, at 86–87.
4 Robert Salvayre, Louis Douste-Blazy, and Shimon Gatt, eds., Lipid Storage Disorders: Biological and Medical Aspects (New York: Plenum Press,
1987).
5 Karen Bellenir, ed., Genetic Disorders Sourcebook, vol. 13 (New York: Ruffner, 1996); see pt. 3, Lysosomal Storage Diseases.
6 Bruno Volk and Larry Schneck, eds., The Gangliosidoses (New York:
Plenum Press, 1975); Stanley Aronson and Bruno Volk, eds., Cerebral
Sphingolipidoses: A Symposium on Tay-Sachs’ Disease and Allied Disorders (New
York: Academic Press, 1962). One author called TSD ‘‘the prototype
of human sphingolipidoses.’’ Kousaku Ohno, ‘‘Molecular Genetics of
Beta-N-Acetylhexosaminidase Alpha Subunit Mutations,’’ in Lipid Storage Disorders, ed. Salvayre, Douste-Blazy, and Gatt, 215.
7 Paul Edelson, ‘‘The Tay-Sachs Disease Screening Program in the U.S. as
a Model for the Control of Genetic Disease: An Historical Overview,’’
Health Matrix 7 (winter 1997): 125–33; James E. Bowman, ‘‘Cultural and
Ethnic Differences in Genetic Testing,’’ in Genetics in the Clinic: Clinical, Ethical, and Social Implications for Primary Care, ed. Mary Mahowald,
Victor McKusick, Angela Scheuerle, and Timothy Aspinwall (St. Louis:
Mosby, 2001), 107. See also Michael Kaback, Joyce Lim-Steele, Deepti
Dabholkar, David Brown, Nancy Levy, Karen Zeiger, and the International TSD Data Collection Network, ‘‘Tay-Sachs Disease—Carrier
Screening, Prenatal Diagnosis, and the Molecular Era: An Interna[182] Notes to Pages 15–16
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
tional Perspective, 1970 to 1993,’’ Journal of the American Medical Association 270 (17 November 1993): 2307–15. For comparative discussion of
CF screening, see U.S. Congress, Office of Technology Assessment,
Cystic Fibrosis and DNA Tests: Implications for Carrier Screening, OTA-BA-532
(Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1992), 256.
Nicholas Wade, ‘‘Two Scholarly Articles Diverge on Role of Race in
Medicine,’’ New York Times, 20 March 2003, A30.
Rabbi Steven Jacobs, ‘‘A Religious Response to Tay-Sachs Disease
Screening and Prevention,’’ and Rabbi Edward Tenenbaum, ‘‘A Conservative Jewish View of the Tay-Sachs Screening Procedures,’’ both in
Tay-Sachs Disease: Screening and Prevention, ed. Michael Kaback (New York:
Alan R. Liss, 1977), 75–94.
See Karen Brodkin, How Jews Became White Folks and What That Says about
Race in America (New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 1998), and
Richard Delgado and Jean Stefancic, eds., Critical White Studies: Looking
behind the Mirror (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1997).
Gina Kolata, ‘‘Using Genetic Tests, Ashkenazi Jews Vanquish a Disease,’’ New York Times, 18 February 2003, F1.
Quoted in Alison George, ‘‘The Rabbi’s Dilemma,’’ New Scientists, 14
February 2004, 44.
Bonnie Friedman, ‘‘Tay-Sachs and Other Lipid Storage Diseases,’’
HSMHA Health Reports 86 (September 1971): 774. ‘‘When such a diagnosis is made, prospective patients have the opportunity to consider
therapeutic abortion.’’
Clare Kittredge, ‘‘High Tay-Sachs Risk Seen in Franco-Americans,’’
New Hampshire Weekly, 19 April 1992, 1.
Donna St. George, ‘‘The Toll of Tay-Sachs Disease: In Rural Louisiana,
the Mystifying Deaths of ‘Lazy Babies’ Are Solved,’’ Washington Post,
8 January 1991, 8. See also J. Michael Kennedy, ‘‘A Tragic Legacy,’’ Los
Angeles Times, 6 November 1990, E1, and John Pope, ‘‘Deadly Hereditary
Disease Cuts a Swath in Rural LA,’’ New Orleans Times-Picayune, 4 October 1990, A1.
Quoted in Tim Cornwell, ‘‘Jewish Marriage Makers Embrace Testing
for Genetic Disease,’’ London Guardian, 6 March 1994, 27.
Quoted in Gina Kolata, ‘‘Nightmare or the Dream of a New Era in Genetics?’’ New York Times, 7 December 1993, A1.
W. Tay, ‘‘Symmetrical Changes in the Region of the Yellow Spot in
Each Eye of an Infant,’’ Transactions of the Ophthalmological Society (U.K.)
Notes to Pages 17–21 [183]
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
1 (1881): 55–57; B. Sachs, ‘‘On Arrested Cerebral Development with
Special Reference to Its Cortical Pathology,’’ Journal of Nervous and Mental Diseases 14 (1887): 541; B. Sachs, ‘‘A Family Form of Idiocy, Generally Fatal, Associated with Early Blindness,’’ Journal of Nervous and Mental Diseases 21 (1896): 475–79. A useful overview of this early history
is Michael Kaback, ‘‘Tay-Sachs Disease: From Clinical Description to
Prospective Control,’’ in Tay-Sachs Disease, ed. Kaback, 1–7.
Valerie Cowie, ‘‘An Inbuilt Tragedy,’’ Nursing Mirror, 23 February 1983,
48.
Sachs, ‘‘Family Form of Idiocy.’’ See also D. Slome, ‘‘The Genetic Basis
of Amaurotic Family Idiocy,’’ Journal of Genetics 27 (1933): 363–72.
Quoted in P. R. Evans, ‘‘Tay-Sachs Disease: A Centenary,’’ Archives of
Disease in Childhood 62 (1987): 1056–59, at 1058.
Ernst Klenk, ‘‘Beitrage zur chemie der lipodosen (3 mitteilung).
Niemann-Picksche krankheit und amaurotische idiote,’’ Hoppe-Seylers
Zeitschrift für Physiologische Chemie 262 (1939–40): 128–43; Ernst Klenk,
‘‘Uber die ganglioside des gehirns bei der infantilen amaurotischen
idiotie vom typus Tay-Sachs,’’ Berichte der Deutschen Chemischen Gesellschaft
75 (1942): 1632–36.
Lars Svennerholm, ‘‘The Chemical Structure of Normal Human Brain
and Tay-Sachs Gangliosides,’’ Biochemical and Biophysical Research Communications 9 (1962): 436; Lars Svennerholm, ‘‘The Gangliosides,’’ Journal
of Lipid Research 41 (April 1964): 145–55; Bruno W. Volk, ed. Tay-Sachs
Disease (New York: Grune and Stratton, 1964); H. G. Hers, Gastroenterology 48 (1965): 625. See also R. Ledeen and K. Salsman, ‘‘Structure of
the Tay-Sachs’ Ganglioside, I,’’ Biochemistry 4 (1965): 2225–32.
Slome, ‘‘Genetic Basis of Amaurotic Family Idiocy’’; S. M. Aronson,
M. P. Valsamis, and B. W. Volk, ‘‘Infantile Amaurotic Family Idiocy:
Occurrences, Genetic Considerations, and Pathophysiology in the
Non-Jewish Infant,’’ Pediatrics 26 (1960): 229–42.
Roscoe Brady, ‘‘Tay-Sachs Disease,’’ New England Journal of Medicine 281
(1969): 1243–44, at 1243.
Bruno Volk, ‘‘Understanding Tay-Sachs Disease: Recent Advances,’’
Clinical Pediatrics 5 (November 1966): 653–54; Robert H. Wilkins and
Irwin A. Brody, ‘‘Tay-Sachs’ Disease,’’ Archives of Neurology 20 (January
1969): 103.
Shintaro Okada and John O’Brien, ‘‘Tay-Sachs Disease: Generalized
[184] Notes to Pages 21–24
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
Absence of a Beta-D-N-acetylhexosaminidase Component,’’ Science 165
(15 August 1969): 698–700.
John O’Brien, Shintaro Okada, A. Chen, and Dorothy Fillerup, ‘‘TaySachs Disease: Detection of Heterozygotes and Homozygotes by
Serum Hexosaminidase Assay,’’ New England Journal of Medicine 283
(2 July 1970): 15–20; John O’Brien, Shintaro Okada, Dorothy Fillerup,
M. Lois Veath, Bruce Adornata, Paul Brenner, and Jules Leroy, ‘‘TaySachs Disease: Prenatal Diagnosis,’’ Science 172 (2 April 1971): 61–64.
N. C. Myrianthopoulos and S. M. Aronson, ‘‘Population Dynamics of
Tay-Sachs Disease. I. Reproductive Fitness and Selection,’’ American
Journal of Human Genetics 18 (July 1966): 313–27; C. Sheba, ‘‘Jewish Migration in Its Historical Perspective,’’ Israel Journal of Medical Sciences
7 (1971): 1333–41; Arlene Fraikor, ‘‘Tay-Sachs Disease: Genetic Drift
among the Ashkenazim Jews,’’ Social Biology 24 (1977): 117–34.
Fraikor, ‘‘Tay-Sachs Disease: Genetic Drift,’’ 129, 131.
Jared Diamond, ‘‘Curse and Blessing of the Ghetto,’’ Discover, March
1991, 60–65.
Diane Hamilton, ‘‘A Nursing Challenge: Adult-Onset Tay-Sachs Disease,’’ Archives of Psychiatric Nursing 5 (December 1991): 382–85, at 382,
quoting from an article by John S. O’Brien, ‘‘The Gangliosides,’’ in The
Metabolic Basis of Inherited Disease, ed. J. B. Stanburg (New York: McGraw
Hill, 1983). See also P. L. Rosebush et al., ‘‘Late-Onset Tay-Sachs Disease Presenting as Catatonic Schizophrenia: Diagnostic and Treatment Issues,’’ Journal of Clinical Psychiatry 56 (August 1995): 347–53.
Distinct from the ‘‘classic infantile form of the disorder,’’ patients with
the ‘‘so-called juvenile form of the illness typically develop obvious
signs and symptoms in early childhood (ages 1–9 years) and usually
die in their midteens’’ (347). It also became clear that ‘‘other patients
with hexosaminidase deficiency follow a less malignant clinical course
and can live into adulthood’’ (347).
Friedman, ‘‘Tay-Sachs and Other Lipid Storage Diseases,’’ 774.
J. F. Tallman, P. G. Pentcheve, and R. O. Brady, ‘‘An Enzymological Approach to the Lipidoses,’’ Enzyme 18 (1974): 136–49; R. J. Desnick, R. W.
Bernlohr, and W. Krivit, ‘‘Enzyme Therapy for Inborn Errors of Metabolism,’’ Postgraduate Medicine 53 (1973): 214–16.
On ethical issues in Gaucher’s testing, see, for example, Bowman,
‘‘Cultural and Ethnic Differences in Genetic Testing.’’
Notes to Pages 24–30 [185]
36 R. O. Brady, P. G. Pentcheve, and A. G. Gal, ‘‘Investigations in Enzyme
Replacement Therapy in Lipid Storage Diseases,’’ Federation Proceedings
34 (April 1975): 1310–15, at 1314. See also H. L. Nadler, ‘‘Current Status
of Treatment in Storage Disorders,’’ Birth Defects: Original Articles Series
12 (1976): 177–88, and P. G. Pentchev, ‘‘Enzyme Replacement Therapy
in Gaucher’s and Fabry’s Disease,’’ Annals of Clinical and Laboratory Science 7 (1977): 251–53.
37 J. M. Tager, M. N. Hamers, et al., ‘‘An Appraisal of Human Trials in
Enzyme Therapy of Genetic Disease,’’ Birth Defects: Original Articles Series
16 (1980): 343–59; R. O. Brady et al., ‘‘Status of Enzyme Replacement
Therapy for Gaucher’s Disease,’’ Birth Defects: Original Articles Series 16
(1980): 361–68.
38 Robert J. Desnick and James Goldberg, ‘‘Tay-Sachs Disease: Prospects
for Therapeutic Intervention,’’ in Tay-Sachs Disease, ed. Kaback, 129–41,
at 138.
39 E. Beutler and G. L. Dale, ‘‘Gaucher Disease: A Century of Delineation and Research. Enzyme Replacement Therapy: Model and Clinical
Studies,’’ Progress in Clinical and Biological Research 95 (1982): 703–16.
40 Desnick and Goldberg, ‘‘Tay-Sachs Disease,’’ 137–38.
41 N. W. Barton et al., ‘‘Therapeutic Response to Intravenous Infusions
of Glucocerebrosidase in a Patient with Gaucher Disease,’’ Proceedings
of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 87 (1990):
1913–16; E. Beutler et al., ‘‘Enzyme Replacement Therapy for Gaucher
Disease,’’ Blood 78 (1991): 1183–89; A. C. Kay et al., ‘‘Enzyme Replacement Therapy in Type I Gaucher Disease,’’ Transactions of the Association
of American Physicians 104 (1991): 258–64.
42 J. M. Rappaport et al., ‘‘Bone Marrow Transplantation in Gaucher Disease,’’ Birth Defects: Original Article Series 22 (1986): 101–9; P. V. Choudary et al., ‘‘The Molecular Biology of Gaucher Disease and the Potential for Gene Therapy,’’ Cold Spring Harbor Symposia on Quantitative Biology
2 (1986): 2; O. C. Ringden et al., ‘‘Long-Term Follow-up of the First
Successful Bone Marrow Transplantation in Gaucher Disease,’’ Transplantation 46 (1988): 66–70; D. B. Kohn et al., ‘‘Toward Gene Therapy
for Gaucher Disease,’’ Human Gene Therapy 2 (1991): 101–5; O. C. Ringden et al., ‘‘Ten Years’ Experience of Bone Marrow Transplantation for
Gaucher Disease,’’ Transplantation 59 (1995): 864–70; Ernest Beutler,
‘‘Newer Aspects of Some Interesting Lipid Storage Diseases: Tay-Sachs
and Gaucher’s Disease,’’ Western Journal of Medicine 126 (January 1977):
[186] Notes to Pages 31–32
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
53. ‘‘In the complex setting of far-advanced Gaucher’s disease, the results of therapy are not easy to evaluate,’’ noted Beutler. His article included no considerations of therapy in Tay-Sachs.
E. Beutler, ‘‘Economic Malpractice in the Treatment of Gaucher’s Disease,’’ American Journal of Medicine 97 (July 1994): 1–2.
Diane Paul, Controlling Human Heredity, 1865 to the Present (Atlantic Highlands, N.J.: Humanities Press, 1995).
See, for example, An Act to Amend the Public Health Service Act to Provide for
the Control of Sickle Cell Anemia [National Sickle Cell Anemia Control Act],
Public Law 92-294, 86 Stat. 138, 16 May 1972; Cooley’s Anemia Screening
and Counseling Program: Hearing . . . to Amend the Public Health Service Act to
Provide for the Prevention of Cooley’s Anemia, 92d Cong., 2d sess., 23 May
1972; Hemophilia act of 1973: Hearing . . . to Amend the Public Health Service
Act, 93d Cong., 1st sess., 15 November 1973; A Bill to Amend the Public
Health Service Act to Provide for the Screening and Counseling of Americans with
Respect to Tay-Sachs Disease, H.R. 2569, 94th Cong., 1st sess., 3 February
1975; A Bill to Amend the Public Health Service Act to Establish a National Program with Respect to Genetic Disease, S. 1715, 94th Cong., 1st sess., 12 May
1975; National Tay-Sachs Disease Screening and Counseling Act, H.R. 2889,
96th Cong., 1st sess., 14 March 1979.
E. Beck, S. Blaichman, C. R. Scriver, and C. L. Clow, ‘‘Advocacy and
Compliance in Genetic Screening,’’ New England Journal of Medicine 291
(28 November 1974): 1166. See also Michael Kaback, ‘‘Heterozygote
Screening: A Social Challenge,’’ New England Journal of Medicine 289
(15 November 1973): 1090–91.
John O’Brien, ‘‘Tay-Sachs Disease: From Enzyme to Prevention,’’ Contributions of Neurochemistry to Neurology and Psychiatry 32 (February 1973):
191–99.
James M. Gustafson, ‘‘Genetic Screening and Human Values: An Analysis,’’ in Ethical, Social, and Legal Dimensions of Screening for Human Genetic
Disease, ed. Daniel Bergsma (New York: Stratton Intercontinental Medical Book Corporation, 1974), 201–24, at 211.
Rabbi Roland B. Gittlesohn, president of the Central Conference of
American (Reform) Rabbis, quoted in ‘‘Mixed Marriage Feelings,’’ Time,
5 July 1971, 52. See also ‘‘Intermarriage Threatens American Jewish
Community,’’ USA Today 108, no. 2415 (December 1979): 10–11, and
Marshall Sklare, ‘‘Intermarriage and Jewish Survival,’’ Commentary,
March 1970, 51–58.
Notes to Pages 32–35 [187]
50 G. Scheiderman, J. A. Lowden, and Q. Rae-Grant, ‘‘Tay-Sachs’ and Related Lipid Storage Diseases: A Study of Families,’’ Canadian Psychiatric
Association Journal 18 (June 1973): 217.
51 ‘‘Poster Child Named,’’ New York Times, 21 February 1972, sec. 2, p. 35;
Frank Deford, Alex: The Life of a Child (New York: Viking, 1983).
52 Barbara Mahany, ‘‘Tay-Sachs Test Eases the Fears of Orthodox Jews,’’
Chicago Tribune, 7 February 1994, 2.
53 William Curran, ‘‘Tay-Sachs Disease, Wrongful Life, and Preventive
Malpractice,’’ American Journal of Public Health 67 (June 1977): 568. As
Curran notes, in one legal case in New York, a judge agreed with the
parents of a TSD child that ‘‘the obstetrician did not take the proper
steps to counsel them about the dangers they were running, or to conduct the necessary tests, or to perform or advise on an abortion.’’
54 Matthew Frye Jacobsen, Whiteness of a Different Color: European Immigrants
and the Alchemy of Race (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press,
1998), 199; Brodkin, How Jews Became White Folks; Gilbert S. Rosenthal,
The Jewish Family in a Changing World (New York: Thomas Yoseloff, 1970),
quoted in Arlene Fraikor, ‘‘TSD and Life in New York City,’’ in Tay-Sachs
Disease, ed. Kaback, 119.
55 Desnick and Goldberg, ‘‘Tay-Sachs Disease,’’ 138.
56 Frederick Hecht, ‘‘Screening People of Jewish Origin for Tay-Sachs
Disease Carriers,’’ Arizona Medicine, January 1981, 23–25.
57 R. M. Schmidt and W. J. Curran, ‘‘A National Genetic-Disease Program:
Some Issues of Implementation,’’ New England Journal of Medicine 293
(October 1976): 819–20.
58 Ibid., 820.
59 F. J. Ingelfinger, ‘‘Sounding Board: Cozening the People with Ambiguous Claims,’’ New England Journal of Medicine 297 (August 1977): 334.
60 R. H. Kenen and R. M. Schmidt, ‘‘Stigmatization of Carrier Status:
Social Implications of Heterozygote Genetic Screening Programs,’’
American Journal of Public Health 68 (November 1978): 1119. The authors
continued: ‘‘Two studies indicate that religious couples accept the
birth of a child with a severe defect with fewer guilt feelings than do
more secular oriented parents, the event being viewed as ‘God’s will’.
Will these individuals be more likely to accept carrier status as God’s
will, thus alleviating their anxieties and feelings of inadequacy?’’
61 Linus Pauling, ‘‘Reflections on a New Biology: Foreword,’’ UCLA Law
Review 15 (1968): 269. For more on this controversy, see Keith Wailoo,
[188] Notes to Pages 35–38
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
Dying in the City of the Blues: Sickle Cell Anemia and the Politics of Race and
Health (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2001), 186.
J. M. Swint, J. M. Shapiro, V. L. Corson, L. W. Reynolds, G. H. Thomas,
and H. H. Kazazian, ‘‘The Economic Returns to Community and Hospital Screening Programs for Genetic Disease,’’ Preventive Medicine 8
(1979): 463–70.
Madeleine Goodman and Lenn Goodman, ‘‘The Overselling of Genetic
Anxiety,’’ Hastings Center Report, October 1982, 20–27, at 20.
P. Carmody, M. Rattazzi, and R. Davidson, ‘‘Tay-Sachs Disease: The
Use of Tears for the Detection of Heterozygotes,’’ New England Journal
of Medicine 289 (15 November 1973): 1072–74.
P. Steiner-Grossman and K. L. David, ‘‘Involvement of Rabbis in Counseling and Referral for Genetic Conditions: Results of a Survey,’’ American Journal of Human Genetics 53 (1993): 1360.
Goodman and Goodman, ‘‘Overselling of Genetic Anxiety,’’ 23.
Jane Feldman Paritzky, ‘‘Tay-Sachs: The Dreaded Inheritance,’’ American Journal of Nursing, March 1985, 260–64.
E. D. Rosenstein, L. Godmilow, and K. Hirschhorn, ‘‘An Assessment
of Physician Knowledge of Tay Sachs Disease,’’ Mount Sinai Journal of
Medicine 47 (January–February 1980): 1–4.
P. M. Tocci, ‘‘Seven Years Experience with Tay-Sachs Screening in Florida,’’ Journal of the Florida Medical Association 68 (January 1981): 24–29.
Roscoe Brady, ‘‘Control and Therapy of Lipid Storage Diseases: Present
Status and Future Strategies,’’ Alabama Journal of Medical Sciences 19
(1982): 161–64.
B. Merz, ‘‘Matchmaking Scheme Solves Tay-Sachs Problem,’’ Journal of
the American Medical Association 258 (20 November 1987): 2636–37. As
this article noted, ‘‘The rabbi proposed the idea to Robert Desnick
. . . director of the Center for Jewish Genetic Diseases at Mount Sinai
School of Medicine. Desnick was taken with the logic of the scheme
and offered to assist in the organization of this novel screening program.’’
H. R. Spiers, ‘‘Community Consultation and AIDS Clinical Trials:
I. IRB Rev.,’’ Human Subjects Research 13, no. 3 (May–June 1991): 7–10;
E. N. Dorff, ‘‘Jewish Theological and Moral Reflections on Genetic
Screening: The Case of BRCA1,’’ Health Matrix 7, no. 1 (winter 1997:
65–96.
Quoted in Judy Siegel-Itzkovich, ‘‘Genetic ‘Matchmakers’ Prevent
Notes to Pages 38–41 [189]
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81
82
83
84
85
Tragedy,’’ Jerusalem Post, 6 March 2003, 7. See also Kolata, ‘‘Using Genetic Tests, Ashkenazi Jews Vanquish a Disease.’’
E. Andermann, C. R. Scriver, L. S. Wolfe, L. Dansky, and F. Andermann, ‘‘Genetic Variants of Tay-Sachs Disease: Tay-Sachs Disease and
Sandhoff ’s Disease in French Canadians, Juvenile Tay-Sachs Disease
in Lebanese Canadians, and a Tay-Sachs Screening Program in the
French-Canadian Population,’’ in Tay-Sachs Disease, ed. Kaback, 161–88.
Quoted in George, ‘‘Rabbi’s Dilemma,’’ 44.
Steiner-Grossman and David, ‘‘Involvement of Rabbis in Counseling
and Referral for Genetic Conditions.’’
The term Ultra-Orthodox, though controversial, often refers to Haredi
Judaism or Hasidic Judaism—the most theologically conservative form
of Judaism, whose adherents see themselves as linked in an unbroken chain back to Moses and the giving of the Torah on Mount Sinai.
As a result, they often see non-Orthodox denominations as deviations
from true Judaism and thus as not truly Jewish. On this tension, see
Noah Efron and Norah Efron, Real Jews: Secular versus Ultra-Orthodox: The
Struggle for Jewish Identity in Israel (New York: Basic Books, 2003). See also
E. Broide, M. Zeigler, J. Ekstein, and G. Bach, ‘‘Screening for Carriers
of Tay-Sachs Disease in the Ultraorthodox Ashkenazi Jewish Community in Israel,’’ American Journal of Medical Genetics 47 (15 August 1993):
213–15.
Quoted in George, ‘‘Rabbi’s Dilemma,’’ 44.
Merz, ‘‘Matchmaking Scheme,’’ 2639. See also J. Brown, ‘‘Prenatal
Screening in Jewish Law,’’ Journal of Medical Ethics 16 (1990): 75–80.
Gideon Back, chairman of the Human Genetics Hadasch University
Hospital in Jerusalem and Dor Yeshorim board member, quoted in
Netty Gross, ‘‘When the Genes Don’t Match,’’ Jerusalem Report, 7 March
2005, 20.
Mahany, ‘‘Tay-Sachs Test Eases Fears of Orthodox Jews,’’ 1.
Siegel-Itzkovich, ‘‘Genetic ‘Matchmakers’ Prevent Tragedy,’’ 7.
U.S. Congress, Office of Technology Assessment, Cystic Fibrosis and DNA
Tests, 256.
Kolata, ‘‘Nightmare or the Dream of a New Era in Genetics?’’ A1.
Ibid. The reference to dating should not be understood as the common Western practice of two individuals meeting socially. In Orthodox
communities it entails more carefully circumscribed meeting between
the couple’s parents or fathers.
[190] Notes to Pages 41–44
86 Seigler and Collins both quoted in ibid.
87 Sura Jeselsohn, ‘‘In Genetics, Too, an Ounce of Prevention,’’ letter to
the editor, New York Times, 11 December 1993, A24.
88 See, for example, Robert J. Desnick, Mount Sinai School of Medicine, New York, ‘‘Genetic Testing in the Ashkenazi Jewish Population’’
(grant #R01 HG00644, grant period 4/1/93–3/31/96):
The objective of this research is to conduct and evaluate a pilot program for the simultaneous screening of carriers for CF, TSD, and
Gaucher’s Disease in the Ashkenazi Jewish population. This ethnic
group is unique since 95 percent of CF and GD carriers can be detected, providing the rationale to introduce CF and GD screening in
conjunction with TSD carrier screening programs. This pilot study
will address issues of education, improved and cost effective test
methods, effective counseling and potential psychological harm,
as well as ethical and health policy considerations. 10,000 Ashkenazi Jewish participants (about 5,000 couples) will be recruited for
the study. Comparison of screening for these diseases will permit
identification of screening issues related to differences in disease
severity, availability of treatment, and detection accuracy for carrier couples.
89 Cornwell, ‘‘Jewish Marriage Makers Embrace Testing for Genetic Disease,’’ 27.
90 Nicholas Wade, ‘‘Gene Mutation Tied to Colon Cancers in Ashkenazi
Jews,’’ New York Times, 26 August 1997, A1; Nicholas Wade, ‘‘Testing
Genes to Save a Life without Costing You a Job,’’ New York Times, 14 September 1997, WK5. The latter article explores ‘‘potential problems with
discrimination arising from genetic testing . . . in light of recent discovery of test for genetic mutation that increases risk of colon cancer
among Askenazi Jews.’’
91 Gina Kolata, ‘‘Bad Genes: A Cancer-Causing Mutation Is Found in
European Jews,’’ New York Times, 1 October 1995, sec. 4, p. 2; Richard
Saltus, ‘‘Gene in Some Jewish Women Tied to Cancer Risk,’’ Boston
Globe, 29 September 1995, 1; Rick Weiss, ‘‘High Cancer Risk Found
in Some Jewish Women,’’ Chicago Sun-Times, 29 September 1995, 3. As
one article noted, ‘‘Scientists have discovered a specific mutation in
the BRCA-1 gene that apparently exists solely in Jews whose forebears
came from eastern Europe, perhaps explaining why women in that
Notes to Pages 45–46 [191]
92
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
100
population are at elevated risk for breast cancer.’’ ‘‘Ashkenazi Jewish
Women Linked to Mutated Breast Cancer,’’ Buffalo News, 30 August
1995, A6.
Quoted in Siegel-Itzkovich, ‘‘Genetic ‘Matchmakers’ Prevent Tragedies,’’ 7.
Denise Grady, ‘‘Gene Identified as Major Cause of Deafness in Ashkenazi Jews,’’ New York Times, 19 November 1998, A22.
Rabbi J. J. Rosner, quoted in Gross, ‘‘When the Genes Don’t Match,’’
20.
D. Kronn et al., ‘‘Carrier Screening for Cystic Fibrosis, Gaucher Disease, and Tay-Sachs Disease in Askenazi Jewish Population: the First
1000 Cases at New York University Medical Center,’’ Archives of Internal
Medicine 158 (1998): 777–81.
Gross, ‘‘When the Genes Don’t Match,’’ 20.
S. Lehrman, ‘‘Jewish Leaders Seek Genetic Guidelines,’’ Nature 389
(25 September 1997): 322; K. H. Rothenberg, ‘‘Breast Cancer, the Genetic Quick Fix, and the Jewish Community: Ethical, Legal, and Social
Challenges,’’ Health Matrix 7, no. 1 (winter 1997): 97–124.
Jim Ritter, ‘‘Genes May Be Leading Jews into Danger,’’ Chicago SunTimes, 28 November 1999, 10. On insurance and genetic discrimination, see, for example, Tina Hesman, ‘‘Genetic Tests Are Raising Privacy Issues: Discrimination by Insurance Firms, Employers Is Feared,’’
St. Louis Post-Dispatch, 2 July 2000, A1.
Ritter, ‘‘Genes May Be Leading Jews into Danger,’’ 10. Reports varied as
to the actual number of diseases targeted by the Dor Yeshorim. A 2003
article in the Jerusalem Post, for example, mentions family dysautonomia, cystic fibrosis, Canavan’s disease, Fanconi’s anemia type C, glycogen storage disease, and Bloom’s syndrome; Siegel-Itzkovich, ‘‘Genetic ‘Matchmakers’ Prevent Tragedies,’’ 7. A 2000 article in the St.
Louis Post-Dispatch mentions TSD, Canavan’s disease, cystic fibrosis,
and Fanconi’s anemia; Hesman, ‘‘Genetic Tests Are Raising Privacy
Issues,’’ A1.
Tay-Sachs may be better known as a ‘‘Jewish genetic disease,’’ but
type I Gaucher’s is in fact more prevalent among Ashkenazic Jews.
Gaucher’s is routinely said to be ‘‘the most common lipid storage disorder’’ as well as ‘‘the most common genetic disorder affecting Jewish
people of Eastern European descent.’’ National Gaucher Foundation
website (http://www.gaucherdisease.org), accessed 11 July 2005. See
[192] Notes to Pages 47–51
101
102
103
104
105
106
107
108
also Robert J. Desnick, ‘‘Gaucher Disease (1882–1982): Centennial Perspectives on the Most Prevalent Jewish Genetic Disease,’’ Mount Sinai
Journal of Medicine 49 (November–December 1982): 443–55.
N. C. Myrianthopoulos, ‘‘Molecular Approaches in the Prenatal Diagnosis and Therapy of Genetic Disorders,’’ Fetal Therapy 2 (1987): 166;
W. Krivit, C. B. Whitley, G. Lund, W. K. C. Ramsey, and J. H. Kersey, ‘‘Improvement of Clinical Expression of Central Nervous System
Manifestations in Lysosomal Storage Diseases Treated by Bone Marrow Transplantation,’’ in Recent Advances and Future Directions in Bone Marrow Transplantation, ed. S. J. Baum, G. W. Santos, and F. Takuku, (New
York: Springer, 1987), 189–94. Gaucher’s types II and III both have
neurological involvement and are resistant to treatment by enzyme replacement. Insofar as there was hope at all in the 1980s for enzyme
replacement treatment for lysosomal storage disorders, it was in Gaucher’s type I.
The disease was discovered by a French medical student named Philippe Charles Ernest Gaucher. Upon postmortem examination of a
patient, Gaucher found that the cells in the spleen were swollen. Those
enlarged cells (now called Gaucher cells) became the telltale sign of the
disease. Gaucher described his clinical and pathological findings in his
doctoral thesis, allowing other physicians to diagnose the condition.
Robert Reingold, ‘‘Drugs That Promise Help but Not Profit Reside in
Limbo,’’ New York Times, 17 March 1981, C1.
M. L. Figueroa et al., ‘‘A Less Costly Regimen of Alglucerase to Treat
Gaucher’s Disease,’’ New England Journal of Medicine 327 (1992): 1632–
36; A. M. Garber, ‘‘No Price Too High?’’ New England Journal of Medicine
327 (1992): 1676–78; A. Zimran et al., ‘‘Home Treatment with Intravenous Enzyme Replacement Therapy for Gaucher Disease: An International Collaborative Study of 33 Patients,’’ Blood 82 (1993): 1107–9.
Kolata, ‘‘Nightmare or the Dream of a New Era in Genetics?’’ A1.
D. P. Goldman, A. E. Clarke, and A. M. Garber, ‘‘Creating the Costliest
Orphan: The Orphan Drug Act in the Development of Ceredase,’’ International Journal of Technology Assessment in Health Care 8 (1992): 583–97.
A chronology of the story of Genzyme and Ceredase can be found in
Ronald Rosenberg, ‘‘Biotechnology: Genzyme to Raise Profile, Stakes
Company Facing Growth Challenges,’’ Boston Globe, 20 September
2000, E4.
Ibid.
Notes to Pages 51–53 [193]
109 Ekstein quoted in Kolata, ‘‘Nightmare or the Dream of a New Era in
Genetics?’’ A1.
110 The attitude toward Gaucher’s in Israel is perhaps the best example
of a nation taking communal responsibility for a disease. Gaucher’s
is one of four serious diseases covered by Israeli national health insurance. Care for the disease is very expensive, akin to that for hemophilia, kidney disease, and thalassemia. A report in the Jerusalem Post on
genetic disease testing and prevention that did not include Gaucher’s
elicited a revealing response from an American concerned about this
omission. Writing from the Yale University Gaucher’s Disease Center,
Wayne Rosenfield inquired of the author, ‘‘You omitted any mention
of Gaucher Disease . . . the most common genetic disorder among
the Jewish people, with a carrier rate of 1 in 14 Jews of Eastern European ancestry.’’ The author replied that testing for Gaucher’s was not
the norm in Israel and did not fall under the testing practices of the
Dor Yeshorim: ‘‘The organization does not test for Gaucher’s, as this
is not considered a reason for not marrying. Today’s treatments for
Gaucher’s, which in Israel are covered by the basket of health services
provided by the public health funds, are very effective.’’ Screening for
Gaucher’s would merely cause ‘‘needless anxiety.’’ Siegel-Itzkovich,
‘‘Genetic ‘Matchmakers’ Prevent Tragedies,’’ 7.
111 Ekstein quoted in George, ‘‘Rabbi’s Dilemma,’’ 44. Commenting on
the patenting of genes and the profit motive in genetic disease testing and management, Ekstein noted that ‘‘companies sometimes get
greedy and charge way too much, which can prevent people from taking a test.’’
112 Quoted in Kolata, ‘‘Bad Genes,’’ 2.
113 See, for example, Tarek Hamada, ‘‘Thousands of Jews Use Genetics to
Track an Elusive Deadly Killer,’’ Detroit News, 17 December 1993, B1.
114 Consider, for example, the writing of Jared Diamond. Other authors
have characterized the spectrum of ‘‘Jewish genetic diseases’’ as having
conferred similar benefits. While such theories are built on historical
associations and grand speculation, they nonetheless exemplify the
continuing impulse to use genetics to link people’s imagined past to
their vital present. Diamond, ‘‘Curse and Blessing of the Ghetto’’; Josie
Glausiusz, ‘‘Unfortunate Drift,’’ Discover, June 1995, 34–35. See also
Rick Weiss, ‘‘Discovery of ‘Jewish’ Cancer Gene Raises Fears of More
Than Disease,’’ Washington Post, 3 September 1997, A1; Karen Rafin[194] Notes to Pages 53–58
ski, ‘‘Early Warning,’’ Chicago Tribune, 5 June 1997, 2; and Gina Kolata,
‘‘Breast Cancer Gene in 1% of U.S. Jews,’’ New York Times, 29 September
1995, A24; Nicholas Wade, ‘‘Researchers Say Intelligence and Diseases
May Be Linked in Ashkenazic Genes,’’ New York Times, 3 June 2005, A21.
115 Arthur Beaudet, ‘‘Gaucher’s Disease,’’ New England Journal of Medicine
316 (5 March 1987): 620.
116 ‘‘Healthy Baby Is Born after Test for Deadly Gene,’’ New York Times,
28 January 1994, A17.
chapter 2. risky business in white america
1 Natalie Angier, ‘‘Gene Therapy Begins for Fatal Lung Disease: Cystic
Fibrosis Patient Inhales Altered Cold Virus,’’ New York Times, 20 April
1993, C5.
2 Quoted in Gina Kolata, ‘‘Nightmare or the Dream of a New Era in Genetics?’’ New York Times, 7 December 1993, A1.
3 Such descriptions could be found in medical articles, scientific treatises, and popular media. For example, one author wrote, ‘‘CF is most
prevalent among people of Central European ancestry . . . and is somewhat less common in Scandinavia.’’ Yet the author also noted that
CF had been reported in about 1 in 17,000 black Americans, and 1 in
90,000 Asians (mainly Japanese) in Hawaii, but that the prevalence
of CF in Asia and Africa had not been adequately investigated: ‘‘It is
possible that its true prevalence is masked by high infant mortality in
large populations of these continents.’’ Thomas G. Benedek, ‘‘Cystic
Fibrosis,’’ in The Cambridge Historical Dictionary of Disease, ed. Kenneth F.
Kiple (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2003), 84. See also Tim
Beardsley, ‘‘Clearing the Airways: Cystic Fibrosis May Be Treated with
Gene Therapy,’’ Scientific American, December 1990, 28 (‘‘most common
genetic disease of white people’’); Purvis, ‘‘Laying Siege to a Deadly
Gene,’’ 60 (‘‘most common inherited disorder among whites’’); and
Jeannette Dankert-Roelse and Gerard Te Meerman, ‘‘Screening for Cystic Fibrosis: Time to Change Our Position?’’ New England Journal of Medicine 337 (2 October 1997): 997 (‘‘one of the most common inheritable
diseases among white people’’).
4 B. Kerem, J. M. Rommens, J. A. Buchanan, D. Markiewicz, T. K. Cox,
A. Chakravarti, M. Buchwald, and L. C. Tsui, ‘‘Identification of the Cystic Fibrosis Gene: Genetic Analysis,’’ Science 245 (8 September 1989):
1073–80. Thus, one should speak not of a CF gene but of a wide range
Notes to Pages 59–62 [195]
of genetic mutations resulting in the diverse phenomena known as
cystic fibrosis. Xavier Estivill, Consul Bancells, Cristina Ramos, and
the Biomed CF Mutation Analysis Consortium, ‘‘Geographic Distribution and Regional Origin of 272 Cystic Fibrosis Mutations in European
Populations,’’ Human Mutation 10 (1997): 135–54, at 152. In such studies
the tendency has been to focus not on the distribution of CF itself but
on that percentage of CF patients carrying the DF508 gene—a distinct
subset of the larger CF population.
5 Genoveva Keyeux et al., ‘‘CFTR Mutations in Patients from Colombia:
Implications for Local and Regional Molecular Diagnosis Programs,’’
Human Mutation 22 (September 2003): 259. As another study from Latin
America concluded, ‘‘Our data suggest that CF mutations in Ecuador
. . . have a different ethiology [sic] from that of Caucasian populations. This may be the consequence of a different genetic background
in Latin America . . . [where] the most important ethnic groups are
‘mestizo’ [mixture of Spaniard and Amerindian] and Amerindian.’’
Cesar Paz-y-Mino et al., ‘‘The Delta F508 Mutation in Ecuador, South
America,’’ Human Mutation 14 (1999): 348.
6 Estivill et al., ‘‘Geographic Distribution and Regional Origin,’’ 147.
7 One 1992 study, for example, turned attention to the Basque population, one of the oldest ethnic subgroups in Europe, noting that ‘‘the
frequency of the DF 508 mutation in the chromosomes of Basque origin is 87%, compared with 58% in those of Mixed Basque origin.’’
This exceptionally high percentage of the gene among CF patients
suggested that the mutation itself was of ancient European pedigree,
‘‘already present in Europe more than 10,000 years ago.’’ T. Casals
et al., ‘‘Cystic Fibrosis in the Basque Country: High Frequency of Mutation DF508 in Patients of Basque Origin’’ American Journal of Human
Genetics 50 (1992): 404–10, at 404. Another 1992 study used the gene’s
frequency as a basis for scrutinizing the Irish population, bringing a
layer of supposed genetic understanding to Ireland’s political and religious divisions. The study concluded that ‘‘although the populations
of the Republic of Ireland (mostly of Protestant faith) and of Northern Ireland (mostly of Catholic faith) had the same CF incidence (1 in
1800), they differed in the proportion of the DF508 mutation (75%
and 54% respectively).’’ The implications of such findings remained
unclear; some might infer that the Irish Protestants were more European than the Irish Catholics of Northern Ireland. Marc De Braekeleer
[196] Notes to Page 62
8
9
10
11
12
13
and Jocelyne Daignealt, ‘‘Spacial Distribution of the DF508 Mutation
in Cystic Fibrosis: A Review,’’ Human Biology, 64 (2 April 1992): 169–70.
Robert Schulman et al., ‘‘The Gene Doctors: Scientists Are on the Verge
of Curing Life’s Cruelest Diseases,’’ Business Week, 18 November 1985,
76–80; Natalie Angier, ‘‘Panel Permits Use of Genes in Treating Cystic
Fibrosis,’’ New York Times, 4 December 1992, A28; Angier, ‘‘Gene Therapy Begins for Fatal Lung Disease’’; Geoffrey Cowley, ‘‘Closing in on
Cystic Fibrosis: Researchers Are Learning to Replace a Faulty Gene,’’
Newsweek, 3 May 1993, 56.
Elyse Tanouye, ‘‘Majority Supports Gene-Based Therapy, New Survey
Shows,’’ Wall Street Journal, 29 September 1992, B10. This article reports
on a survey sponsored by the March of Dimes Birth Defects Foundation, which found that 89 percent of Americans supported the use of
gene therapy to treat disease. More than 40 percent approved of using
gene therapy to enhance the physical and mental characteristics of
healthy people. A majority also felt that genetic test results need not be
confidential and that employers and insurance companies had a right
to know them. The article noted that Americans approve of gene-based
research and therapy even though ‘‘many don’t understand much about
science.’’ Dr. Howse of the March of Dimes Birth Defects Foundation
is quoted in the article as saying, ‘‘The foundation believes that gene
therapy represents a fundamental leap forward in the cure and treatment of birth defects.’’
Joe Palca, ‘‘The Promise of a Cure,’’ Discover, June 1994, 75–86.
Mark Nichols, ‘‘A Test Case in Hope: A New Treatment Could Cure Cystic Fibrosis,’’ Maclean’s, 3 May 1993, 39.
Leon Jaroff and Hannah Bloch, ‘‘Keys to the Kingdom,’’ Time 148, no.
14, Fall 1996 Special Issue, 24–29; Anderson quoted at 28. Francis Collins
has also endorsed this perspective. In Jean Seligmann, ‘‘Curing Cystic Fibrosis? Genes Convert Sick Cells,’’ Newsweek, 1 October 1990, 64,
he is quoted as saying that ‘‘the new CF research shows that the [gene
therapy] strategy works for an ever-increasing list of disorders where
a defective gene is responsible . . . It gives credence to the idea that
gene therapy will find a significant place in the therapeutic armamentarium.’’
‘‘‘I don’t think chloride regulation is the sole defect, and I’m not sure
it’s the primary pathology,’ cautioned Richard C. Boucher . . . Boucher pointed out that CF patients fall prey to characteristic infections
Notes to Pages 64–65 [197]
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
not found in patients with other lung diseases. To him, that suggested
there may be more to CF than a failure to clear lung mucus.’’ Tim
Beardsley, ‘‘Clearing the Airways: Cystic Fibrosis May Be Treated with
Gene Therapy,’’ Scientific American, December 1990, 29–30. Gene therapy for CF involves delivery of a cystic fibrosis transmembrane regulator (CFTR) gene to the membrane of cells lining the airways of the
lungs. It was suspected that the inability of CF patients to regulate
chloride ions leads to the lung mucus characteristic of this disease.
Sodium ion regulation is also impaired in the CF patient.
Quoted in Andrew Purvis, ‘‘Laying Siege to a Deadly Gene: Thanks to
Series of Breakthroughs, Doctors Are Closing in on a Cure for Cystic
Fibrosis,’’ Time, 24 February 1992, 60–61.
Nancy King, Larry Churchill, Myra Collins, Keith Wailoo, and Stephen
Pemberton, ‘‘Genetic Research as Therapy: Implications of ‘Gene
Therapy’ for Informed Consent,’’ Journal of Law, Medicine, and Ethics 26
(spring 1998): 38–47.
Ellen Lee, ‘‘On the Front Lines against Cystic Fibrosis,’’ Atlanta Journal
and Constitution, 23 August 1998, 4C.
Michael Kernan, ‘‘A Death in the Family: Frank Deford’s Poignant
Goodbye to His Daughter,’’ Washington Post, 27 October 1983, D1.
Frank Deford, Alex: The Life of a Child (New York: Viking, 1983), 32.
Ibid., 43.
A useful overview of the therapeutic history of CF can be found in Carl
Doershuk, ed., Cystic Fibrosis in the Twentieth Century: People, Events, and
Progress (Cleveland, Ohio: AM Publishing, 2001). The framing of disease has a specific place in the recent history and historiography of
medicine. See, for example, Charles E. Rosenberg, ‘‘Framing Disease:
Illness, Society, and History,’’ introduction to Framing Disease: Studies
in Cultural History, ed. Charles E. Rosenberg and Janet Golden (New
Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 1992), xiii–xxvi.
Paul A. di Sant’ Agnese, ‘‘Experiences of a Pioneer Researcher: Discovery of the Sweat Electrolyte Defect and the Early Medical History of
Cystic Fibrosis,’’ in Cystic Fibrosis in the Twentieth Century, ed. Doershuk,
17–35, at 18. Historical accounts of the disease do occasionally claim
that people recognized CF in some form before the 1930s—particularly
in the form of salty sweat. Thomas Benedek recently claimed that CF
was probably recognized many centuries ago, for ‘‘according to a medi-
[198] Notes to Pages 66–68
22
23
24
25
26
eval German saying, ‘The infant who when kissed leaves a taste of salt
will not reach the first year of life.’’’ Benedek, ‘‘Cystic Fibrosis,’’ 84.
Dorothy H. Anderson, ‘‘Cystic Fibrosis of the Pancreas and Its Relation to Celiac Disease: A Clinical and Pathological Study,’’ American Journal of the Diseases of Children 56 (1938): 344–99. The standard treatment
for CF in the 1940s and 1950s was a ‘‘low fat and high protein diet,
vitamins, pancreatin to replace the missing pancreatic enzymes, and
tetracycline for antibiotic therapy.’’ Carl F. Doershuk, ‘‘The Matthews
Comprehensive Treatment Program: A Ray of Hope,’’ in Cystic Fibrosis
in the Twentieth Century, ed. Doershuk, 70.
Sidney Farber, ‘‘Some Organic Digestive Disturbances in Early Life,’’
Journal of the Michigan Medical Society 44 (1945): 587–94. See also Sidney
Farber, ‘‘Pancreatic Function and Disease in Early Life. V. Pathologic
Changes Associated with Pancreatic Insufficiency in Early Life,’’ Archives of Pathology 37 (1944): 238–50. Farber performed eighty-seven
autopsies on infants and children with pancreatic insufficiencies. He
noted pathologic changes in the lungs, upper respiratory tract, liver,
gallbladder, and upper alimentary tract that were similar to those in
the pancreas. He concluded, at the time, that CF was a systemic disease with a variety of clinical appearances. The clinical manifestations
of CF changed relative to what organs were affected by mucolytic obstructions.
In the electrolyte test, Paul di Sant’ Agnese and his associates provided
a diagnostic standard for quantifying the abnormal salt loss found in
the perspiration of some CF patients. See di Sant’ Agnese, ‘‘Experiences of a Pioneer Researcher’’; also P. di Sant’ Agnese, R. Darling,
G. Perera, et al., ‘‘Abnormal Electrolyte Composition of Sweat in Cystic Fibrosis of the Pancreas,’’ Pediatrics 12 (1953): 549–63.
Kenneth S. Landauer, foreword to Guide to Diagnosis and Management of
Cystic Fibrosis: A Syllabus for Physicians (New York: National Cystic Fibrosis Research Foundation, 1963), vi.
‘‘‘New’ Disease,’’ Time, 1 March 1954, quoted in Doershuk, ‘‘Matthews
Comprehensive Treatment Program,’’ 70–71. On the early history of
CF, see also D. A. Christie and E. M. Tansey, eds., Cystic Fibrosis: Wellcome Witnesses to Twentieth Century Medicine, Volume 20 (London: Wellcome
Trust Centre for the History of Medicine at University College, London, 2004).
Notes to Pages 69–70 [199]
27 Paul A. di Sant’ Agnese, ‘‘Cystic Fibrosis: The Problem and the Challenge,’’ in Paul A. di Sant’ Agnese, ed., Research on Pathogenesis of Cystic Fibrosis of the Pancreas (Mucoviscidosis): Proceedings of the Third International Conference on Cystic Fibrosis, Bethesda, Md., 28–30 September 1964,
xxiii.
28 Landauer, foreword to Guide to Diagnosis and Management of Cystic Fibrosis, vi.
29 Doershuk, ‘‘Matthews Comprehensive Treatment Program,’’ 63–78.
30 David J. Rothman, Strangers at the Bedside: A History of How Law and Bioethics Transformed Medical Decision Making (New York: Basic Books, 1991),
141.
31 Doershuk, ‘‘Matthews Comprehensive Treatment Program,’’ 73.
32 Guide to Diagnosis and Management of Cystic Fibrosis.
33 Maarten S. Sibinga, C. Jack Friedman, and Nancy N. Huang, ‘‘The
Family of the Cystic Fibrosis Patient,’’ in Psychosocial Aspects of Cystic
Fibrosis: A Model for Chronic Lung Disease, ed. Paul R. Patterson, Carolyn R.
Denning, and Austin H. Kutscher (New York: Columbia University
Press, 1973), 13–18.
34 Cynthia Mikkelsen, Eugenia Waechter, and Mary Crittenden, ‘‘Cystic
Fibrosis: A Family Challenge,’’ Children Today, July–August 1978, 22–26.
The literature on CF was circumscribed by a range of parent-centered
questions, from the challenges of home diagnosis and home management, to the topic of family communication about CF, to the difficult issue of sibling reactions to CF, and to CF children’s relationship
with peers, their understanding of hospitalization, and their sources
of emotional support.
35 Atul Gawande, ‘‘The Bell Curve,’’ New Yorker, 6 December 2004, 82–91.
36 Gus Cezeaux Jr., Jane Telford, Gunyon Harrison, and Arthur S. Keats,
‘‘Bronchial Lavage in Cystic Fibrosis: A Comparison of Agents,’’ Journal of the American Medical Association 199 (2 January 1967): 73–76.
37 J. Lieberman, ‘‘Dornase Aerosol Effect on Sputum Viscosity in Cases
of Cystic Fibrosis,’’ Journal of the American Medical Association 205 (1968):
312–13.
38 See Paul di Sant’ Agnese, ‘‘Guest Editorial: Fertility and the Young
Adult with Cystic Fibrosis,’’ New England Journal of Medicine 279 (1968):
103–5, and Elvin Kaplan et al., ‘‘Reproductive Failures in Males with
Cystic Fibrosis,’’ New England Journal of Medicine 279 (1968): 65–69.
39 Audrey T. McCollum and Lewis E. Gibson, ‘‘Family Adaptation to the
[200] Notes to Pages 71–73
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
Child with Cystic Fibrosis,’’ Journal of Pediatrics 77 (October 1970): 571–
78. See also Hilaire J. Meuwissen, letter to the editor, Journal of Pediatrics
78 (March 1971): 548–49.
Deford, Alex, 37.
Mikkelsen, Waechter, and Crittenden, ‘‘Cystic Fibrosis: A Family Challenge.’’
Rustin McIntosh, ed., Research on Cystic Fibrosis: Transactions of the International Research Conference on Cystic Fibrosis, Washington, D.C., 7–9 January
1959 (Baltimore, Md.: French-Bray, 1960), xii.
Di Sant’ Agnese, ‘‘Cystic Fibrosis: The Problem and the Challenge,’’
xxiii–xxiv.
‘‘Excerpt: Testimony of Dr. Merlin K. DuVal,’’ in National Heart, Blood
Vessel, Lung, and Blood Act of 1972: Hearings before the Subcommittee on Public
Health and Environment of the Committee on Interstate and Foreign Commerce,
House of Representatives, 92nd U.S. Congress, H.R. 12571, 13715, 12460, 13500,
S. 3323 (and Identical Bills) to Amend the Public Health Service Act . . . April 25–
26, 1972, serial no. 92–71 (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1972), 89.
Ibid., 90.
Dr. Robert Scott, quoted in Nancy Hicks, ‘‘Doctor Asks Curb of Negro
Disease,’’ New York Times, 27 October 1970, A51.
‘‘Statement of Giulio J. Barbero, M.D., Chairman, Department of Pediatrics, Hahnemann Medical College, Philadelphia, PA,’’ in National
Heart, Blood Vessel, Lung, and Blood Act of 1972, 216.
Ibid., 217.
For more details on this tension, see ‘‘Statement of Giulio J. Barbero’’
and ‘‘Excerpt: Testimony of Dr. Merlin K. DuVal,’’ 89.
‘‘Poster Child Named,’’ New York Times, 21 February 1972, sec. 2, p. 35.
The legislation was a powerful symbolic statement of concern for pain
and suffering in black America. See Keith Wailoo, Dying in the City of
the Blues: Sickle Cell Anemia and the Politics of Race and Health (Chapel Hill:
University of North Carolina Press, 2001).
‘‘Statement of Giulio J. Barbero,’’ 218–19.
To be sure, there were exceptions. Researchers in Minnesota continued
to explore its prevalence among Scandinavian Americans, people of
Northern European descent, and other Europeans. See Chronic Respiratory Diseases in Children and Adolescents, special issue of Minnesota Medicine
52 (September 1969).
Notes to Pages 73–79 [201]
54 See Robert C. Stern et al., ‘‘Course of Cystic Fibrosis in Black Patients,’’
Journal of Pediatrics 89 (September 1976): 412–17; Ernest T. Heffer, ‘‘Cystic Fibrosis in Black Children,’’ letter to the editor, Journal of Pediatrics
90 (February 1977); Lucas L. Kulczycki, ‘‘Incidence of Cystic Fibrosis in
Black Children—Revisited,’’ letter to the editor, Journal of Pediatrics 92
(May 1978): 855; and Clifford W. Lober, Hilliard F. Seigler, and Alexander Spock, ‘‘Cystic Fibrosis in a Black Woman,’’ Journal of the American
Medical Association 235 (15 March 1976): 1140–41.
55 Sterling Garrard, Julius Richmond, and Marvin Hirsch, ‘‘Pseudomonas
aeruginosa Infection as a Complication of Therapy in Pancreatic Fibrosis (Mucoviscidosis),’’ Pediatrics, October 1951, 485.
56 M. W. Burns and J. R. May, ‘‘Bacterial Precipitin in Serum of Patients
with Cystic Fibrosis, Lancet, 1968, no. 1:270–72.
57 Deford, Alex, 41.
58 Lucas Kulczycki, Thomas Murphy, and Joseph Bellanti, ‘‘Pseudomonas
Colonization in Cystic Fibrosis: A Study of 160 Patients,’’ Journal of the
American Medical Association 240 (1978): 30–34.
59 Bernard Boxerbaum, Carl Doershuk, and LeRoy Matthews, ‘‘Use of
Antibictics [sic] in Cystic Fibrosis,’’ letter to the editor, Journal of Pediatrics 81 (July 1972): 188.
60 Editor’s commentary on Pierre Beaudry, Melvin Marks, Dianne McDougall, et al., ‘‘Is Anti-Pseudomonas Therapy Warranted in Acute Respiratory Exacerbations in Children with Cystic Fibrosis?’’ Journal of Pediatrics 97 (July 1980): 148; text of article at 144–47.
61 Warren J. Warwick, ‘‘Cystic Fibrosis: An Expanding Challenge for Internal Medicine,’’ Journal of the American Medical Association 238 (14 November 1977): 2159–62.
62 Kulczycki, Murphy, and Bellanti, ‘‘Pseudomonas Colonization in Cystic
Fibrosis,’’ 34.
63 Michael Parry, Harold Neu, Mario Melino, et al., ‘‘Treatment of Pulmonary Infections in Patients with Cystic Fibrosis: A Comparative Study
of Ticarcillin and Gentamicin,’’ Journal of Pediatrics 90 (January 1977):
144–48.
64 Vera A. Loening-Baucke, Elaine Mischler, and Martin G. Myers, ‘‘A
Placebo-Controlled Trial of Cephalexin Therapy in the Ambulatory
Management of Patients with Cystic Fibrosis,’’ Journal of Pediatrics 95
(October 1979): 630–37.
65 Alexander Hyatt, Bradley Chipps, Karen Kumor, et al., ‘‘A Double-Blind
[202] Notes to Pages 79–83
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
Controlled Trial of Anti-Pseudomonas Chemotherapy of Acute Respiratory Exacerbations in Patients with Cystic Fibrosis,’’ Journal of Pediatrics
99 (August 1981): 307–11.
See Gregory L. Kearns et al., ‘‘Dosing Implications of Altered Gentamicin Disposition in Patients with Cystic Fibrosis,’’ Journal of Pediatrics
100 (February 1982): 312–18, and G. Nolan et al., ‘‘Antibiotic Prophylaxis in Cystic Fibrosis: Inhaled Cephaloridine as an Adjunct to Oral
Cloxacillin,’’ Journal of Pediatrics 101 (October 1982): 626–30.
Rita Padoan et al., ‘‘Cefatrizine in Treatment of Acute Pulmonary Exacerbations in Patients with Cystic Fibrosis,’’ Journal of Pediatrics 103
(August 1983): 320.
Richard B. Moss et al., ‘‘Allergy to Semisynthetic Penicillins in Cystic
Fibrosis,’’ Journal of Pediatrics 104 (March 1984): 460–66.
A. Isles et al., ‘‘Pseudomonas cepacia Infection in Cystic Fibrosis: An
Emerging Problem,’’ Journal of Pediatrics 104 (February 1984): 206–10.
R. Wientzen, C. Prestidge, R. I. Kramer, G. H. McCracken, and J. D.
Nelson, ‘‘Acute Pulmonary Exacerbations in Cystic Fibrosis: A DoubleBlind Trial of Tobramycin and Placebo Therapy,’’ American Journal of the
Diseases of Children 134 (1980): 1134.
John D. Nelson, discussion to ‘‘Management of Acute Pulmonary Exacerbations in Cystic Fibrosis: A Critical Appraisal,’’ Journal of Pediatrics
106 (June 1985): 1033–34; text of article at 1030–33.
Kevin Gaskin et al., ‘‘Improved Respiratory Prognosis in Patients with
Cystic Fibrosis with Normal Fat Absorption,’’ Journal of Pediatrics 100
(June 1982): 857–62. See also Giulio Barbero’s accompanying commentary on 914–15.
Anthony K. Webb, ‘‘Management Problems of the Adult with Cystic
Fibrosis,’’ Journal Suisse de Médicine 121 (1991): 110.
W. H. Frist et al., ‘‘Cystic Fibrosis Treated with Heart-Lung Transplantation: North American Results,’’ Transplantation Proceedings 23 (February 1991): 1205–6.
On the impact of cyclosporine, see Renee Fox and Judith Swazey, Spare
Parts: Organ Replacement in American Society (New York: Oxford University Press, 1992). See also R. Y. Calne, D. J. White, S. Thiru, et al.,
‘‘Cyclosporin A in Patients Receiving Renal Allografts from Cadaveric
Donors,’’ Lancet, 1978, no. 2:1323–27.
Robert M. Kotloff and Jonathan B. Zuckerman, ‘‘Lung Transplantation
for Cystic Fibrosis: Special Considerations,’’ Chest 109 (March 1996):
Notes to Pages 83–87 [203]
77
78
79
80
81
787–88. See also Stanley Fiel et al., ‘‘Heart-Lung Transplantation in
Cystic Fibrosis: Overview,’’ Clinical Transplants 3 (1989): 162–63.
‘‘Insurers Debating Transplant Costs: As Success of Surgery Rises,
Medicare and Private Plan Payment Is Restudied,’’ New York Times, 21 November 1983, A20.
Lindsey Gurson, ‘‘Center for Transplants Aids Pittsburgh Ascent,’’ New
York Times, 16 September 1985, A10. Gurson writes, ‘‘Many large teaching hospitals perceive [transplants] as vital to retaining preeminence.’’
See also Tessa Melvin, ‘‘Surgeon Stresses Role of Donors,’’ New York
Times, 30 November 1986, Westchester Weekly section, 641–42; ‘‘Lag
Seen in Transplants,’’ New York Times, 5 November 1991, C7; and Barbara
Stewart, ‘‘Hospitals Press for Expansion of Organ Transplant Units,’’
New York Times, 24 November 1996, NJ6.
See, for example, Perri Klass, ‘‘Shattered Dreams,’’ Discover, July 1988,
34–35. Klass, an adolescent medicine specialist, discussed the centrality of antibiotics not only in clinical management but in the changing power relations between CF adolescents and their caregivers. ‘‘Kids
with cystic fibrosis come into the hospital fairly regularly, whenever
their lungs start getting worse,’’ she wrote. ‘‘They get what we call a
cleanout, a course of multiple, very strong antibiotics, aimed at eradicating the particularly vicious organisms that grow in their lungs.’’
Klass noted that the administration of intravenous antibiotics, however, was complicated by the desire of CF adolescents for control over
the terms of therapy: ‘‘By the time these kids reach their teens, they
know a hell of a lot about IVs . . . They pick a resident whose skills they
approve of. They specify how many times they’ll allow the resident to
try inserting the new IV before they’ll demand to see a senior resident.
Finally they indicate precisely which vein on which arm is available for
the next IV.’’ Klass’s observations highlight the continued complexity
of managing CF, even in the clinical context, as patients became older
and more independent.
Stanley B. Fiel, ‘‘Heart-Lung Transplantation for Patients with Cystic
Fibrosis: A Test of Clinical Wisdom,’’ Archives of Internal Medicine 151
(May 1991): 870.
Claudia Wells and Dick Thompson, ‘‘Hearts of the Matter,’’ Time, 25
May 1987, 60. The advent of lung transplantation in cystic fibrosis
had certainly captured public attention. News accounts followed the
stories of patients who took this daring chance at survival. In some
[204] Notes to Pages 87–88
82
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91
92
cases the stories revealed the willingness of families to offer their own
organs in order to postpone the death of their children. In other cases,
lung transplantation operations even sought to address the lung deterioration preemptively, well before damage had set in. Some surgical
specialists branched out to liver transplants, a possible consideration
for a tiny minority of CF patients.
An article in Redbook, the magazine for parents, reported on two divorced parents who decided to reconcile in order to donate lungs because they ‘‘were the best biological matches.’’ Noted one parent, ‘‘We
gave him life once, and we can do it again.’’ Sally Stich, ‘‘No Time for
Regrets,’’ Redbook, April 1994, 188.
William Plummer and Giovanna Breu, ‘‘A New Breath of Life,’’ People,
6 July 1992, 118.
Quoted in ibid.
Frist et al., ‘‘Cystic Fibrosis Treated with Heart-Lung Transplantation.’’
Fiel, ‘‘Heart-Lung Transplantation for Patients with Cystic Fibrosis,’’
872.
Quoted in Plummer and Breu, ‘‘New Breath of Life,’’ 118.
D. E. Koshland, ‘‘The Cystic Fibrosis Gene Story,’’ Science 245 (8 September 1989): 1029; Kerem et al., ‘‘Identification of the Cystic Fibrosis
Gene: Genetic Analysis’’; J. M. Rommens, M. C. Iannuzzi, B. Kerem,
M. L. Drumm, G. Melmer, M. Dean, R. Rozmahel, J. L. Cole, D. Kennedy, N. Hidaka, M. Zsiga, M. Buchwald, J. R. Riordan, L. C. Tsui, and
F. S. Collins, ‘‘Identification of the Cystic Fibrosis Gene: Chromosome
Walking and Jumping,’’ Science 245 (8 September 1989): 1059–65; Jean
Seligmann and Daniel Glick, ‘‘Cystic Fibrosis: Hunting Down a Killer
Gene,’’ Newsweek, 4 September 1989, 60–61.
Shulman et al., ‘‘Gene Doctors.’’ See also Pat Ohlendorf, ‘‘The Taming
of a Once-Certain Killer,’’ Maclean’s 98 (7 October 1985): 50, 52.
Harold Schmeck, ‘‘Genetic Marker for Cystic Fibrosis Reported
Found,’’ New York Times, 11 October 1995, A17.
Ibid.
Gene therapy also blurred the line between experiment and therapy.
See Larry Churchill, Myra Collins, Nancy King, Stephen Pemberton,
and Keith Wailoo, ‘‘Genetic Research as Therapy: Implications of
‘Gene Therapy’ for Informed Consent,’’ Journal of Law, Medicine, and
Ethics 26 (spring 1998): 38–47; and Nancy King, ‘‘Experimental Treatment: Oxymoron or Aspiration?’’ Hastings Center Report 25 (1995): 6–15.
Notes to Pages 88–96 [205]
93 Gina Kolata, ‘‘Progress Is Cited on Cystic Fibrosis,’’ New York Times,
15 October 1993, A24.
94 Diane Brady, ‘‘Signals of Hope: Gene Therapy May Cure Cystic Fibrosis,’’ Maclean’s, 1 October 1990, 52; Jean Seligmann, ‘‘Curing Cystic
Fibrosis? Genes Convert Sick Cells,’’ Newsweek, 1 October 1990, 64;
Mark Nichols, ‘‘A Test Case in Hope,’’ Maclean’s, 3 May 1993, 39. As
one Wall Street Journal reporter noted in 1992, ‘‘The vast majority of
Americans support the use of gene-based therapy to treat disease, even
though they don’t know much about the emerging science, according
to a new survey.’’ Elyse Tanouye, ‘‘Majority Supports Gene-Based Therapy,’’ Wall Street Journal, 29 September 1992, B10.
95 Angier, ‘‘Gene Therapy Begins for Fatal Lung Disease,’’ C5. See also
Angier, ‘‘Panel Permits Use of Genes.’’
96 Geoffrey Cowley, ‘‘Closing in on Cystic Fibrosis: Researchers Are
Learning to Replace a Faulty Gene,’’ Newsweek, 3 May 1993, 56.
97 W. French Anderson stated in 1996, ‘‘Twenty years from now, gene
therapy will have revolutionized the practice of medicine . . . Virtually
every disease will have gene therapy as one of its treatments.’’ Quoted
in Jaroff and Bloch, ‘‘Keys to the Kingdom,’’ 28.
98 Quotations all from Purvis, ‘‘Laying Siege to a Deadly Gene,’’ 60–61.
99 Joan O’C. Hamilton, ‘‘A Star Drug Is Born,’’ Business Week, 23 August
1993, 66–68.
100 ‘‘F.D.A. Approval Sought for Cystic Fibrosis Drug,’’ New York Times,
31 March 1993, D4. See also ‘‘Drug by Genentech Gets Orphan Status,’’
New York Times, 30 January 1991, D4.
101 John Carey, ‘‘The $600 Million Horse Race,’’ Business Week, 23 August
1993, 68.
102 Natalie Angier, ‘‘Cystic Fibrosis: Experiment Hits a Snag,’’ New York
Times, 22 September 1993, C12. ‘‘To think we’re going to cure cystic
fibrosis in a year is naïve,’’ Dr. Crystal was quoted as saying. ‘‘I’m not
discouraged but this is going to take time and people shouldn’t have
unrealistic expectations.’’
103 Palca, ‘‘Promise of a Cure,’’ 86.
104 Eliot Marshall, ‘‘Gene Therapy’s Growing Pains: The Trouble with Vectors,’’ Science 269 (25 August 1995): 1050–54, at 1052.
105 Palca, ‘‘Promise of a Cure.’’
106 Ibid.
107 Marshall, ‘‘Gene Therapy’s Growing Pains.’’
[206] Notes to Pages 96–100
108 Palca, ‘‘Promise of a Cure,’’ 76. This phrase is the subtitle of Palca’s
essay.
109 Marshal, ‘‘Gene Therapy’s Growing Pains,’’ 1055.
110 Leo Furcht, ‘‘Industry: A Vital Partner for Academic Medicine,’’ Human
Pathology 28 (October 1997): 1117–22; Tinker Ready, ‘‘Market Research
or Scientific Research? Study Raises Questions,’’ Raleigh News and Observer, 16 April 1995, A25.
111 Quoted in Marshal, ‘‘Gene Therapy’s Growing Pains,’’ 1055.
112 Ibid.
113 ‘‘Biotechnology: Seeking Cures and Therapies for Children’s Diseases,’’ publication submitted to hearings by BIO (Biotechnology
Industry Organization); ‘‘Research on Childhood Diseases by Entrepreneurs,’’ Hearing before the Committee on Small Business, United States Senate, 26 May 1994 (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office,
1995), 80.
114 Gina Kolata, ‘‘Gene Therapy Shows No Benefit in Two Studies,’’ New
York Times, 2 September 1995, A24.
115 ‘‘Rates of transfer and expression vary dramatically in different patients.’’ Marshall, ‘‘Gene Therapy’s Growing Pains,’’ 1052.
116 Quoted in Tim Beardsley, ‘‘Clearing the Airways,’’ Scientific American,
December 1990, 28–29.
117 Lawrence Fisher, ‘‘Bottling the Stuff of Dreams: Gains in Gene Therapy Encourage the Industry,’’ New York Times, 1 June 1995, D1.
118 Andrew Pollack, ‘‘Gene Therapy’s Focus Shifts, from Rare Illnesses,’’
New York Times, 4 August 1998, F1.
119 Theodore Friedmann, ‘‘The Promise and Overpromise of Human Gene
Therapy,’’ Gene Therapy 1 (1994): 217–18.
120 Paul Martin and Sandra Thomas, ‘‘The Commercial Development of
Gene Therapy in Europe and the USA,’’ Human Gene Therapy 9 (1 January
1998): 87–114; Breffni X. Baggot, ‘‘Human Gene Therapy Patents in the
United States,’’ Human Gene Therapy 9 (1 January 1998): 151–57; Kathryn
Brown, ‘‘Major Pharmaceutical Companies Infuse Needed Capital into
Gene Therapy Research,’’ Scientist 9 (13 November 1995): 1, 10. The
latter article’s subtitle reads, ‘‘Cautious observers note, however, that
the fate of the new industry may hinge on a flurry of recently approved
trials.’’
121 See glossary entry for ornithine transcarbamoylase (OTC) deficiency.
Jesse Gelsinger had a form of OTC deficiency known as a ‘‘mosaic’’
Notes to Pages 100–104 [207]
122
123
124
125
126
127
128
129
130
131
form, one that originated as a spontaneous mutation when he was in
the womb and did allow his body to produce some very low levels of
functional OTC.
Sheryl Gay Stolberg, ‘‘The Biotech Death of Jesse Gelsinger,’’ New York
Times Magazine 149 (28 November 1999): 136–40, 149–50, at 136–37.
Nicholas Wade, ‘‘Patient Dies in Trial of Gene Treatment,’’ New York
Times, 29 September 1999, A1, A24. The informed-consent paperwork
presented to the Gelsingers leading up to Jesse’s eighteenth birthday
had been drafted with the help of the university’s leading bioethicist,
Arthur Caplan, and had been validated by the university’s Institutional
Review Board and approved by the FDA as well as by the independent federal advisory committee known as the RAC (Recombinant DNA
Advisory Committee), which reports directly to the director of the NIH.
Dateline NBC, 20 September 2002, transcript.
Ibid.
Jesse’s blood disorder produced an unfortunate cascade effect. As the
red blood cells broke down, they liberated protein into the bloodstream. The protein, in turn, stimulated the production of ammonia,
which Jesse’s OTC-deficient liver was not capable of removing. These
signs of liver failure were only the beginning.
The story is outlined in gripping detail in Stolberg, ‘‘Biotech Death of
Jesse Gelsinger.’’
Leslie Roberts, ‘‘A Promising Experiment Ends in Tragedy,’’ cover story,
U.S. News and World Report, 11 October 1999, 43. See also Wade, ‘‘Patient
Dies in Trial of Gene Treatment,’’ A24, where Paul Gelsinger is quoted
as saying, ‘‘The doctors were as devastated as I am. It was because of
these men that I had my son for 18 years.’’
Among the defendants, the suit also named the University of Pennsylvania, two of its affiliated hospitals, and (in a novel twist) Arthur
Caplan, the bioethics professor at Penn who convincingly argued to
the Penn researchers that their trial should target relatively healthy,
adult subjects with OTC deficiency. These subjects, he reasoned, were
wholly capable of making an informed decision; they were less susceptible to exploitation than the sick infants and distraught parents who
are victimized by the severest and most common form of OTC.
Dateline transcript.
A series of errors were attributed to Penn researchers in the wake of the
FDA’s initial investigation. First, although the informed-consent form
[208] Notes to Pages 104–107
132
133
134
135
136
137
138
139
submitted to and approved by the FDA and the RAC did mention the
fatal blood and liver complications suffered by monkeys in Penn’s preclinical studies of the adenovirus, the informed-consent forms signed
by the Gelsingers did not. This was an egregious omission, from the
FDA’s standpoint, especially in light of the fact that the day before
his injection Gelsinger’s ammonia levels had risen to a level that precluded his participation in the experiment (according the protocol’s
own standards).
Julian Savulescu, ‘‘Harm, Ethics, and the Gene Therapy Death,’’ Journal
of Medical Ethics 27 (2001): 148–50.
These facts are outlined in Joanne Silberner, ‘‘A Gene Therapy Death,’’
Hastings Center Report, March–April 2000, 6.
‘‘Penn’s Gene Therapy Director Stepping Down,’’ Gene Therapy Weekly,
23 May 2002, 7–8.
Two gene therapy trials (on liver cancer and colorectal cancer) conducted by the Schering-Plough Company were halted by the FDA. See
‘‘Patient’s Death Stops Gene Therapy Studies,’’ New York Times, 12 October 1999, A29.
Wilson explained, for instance, that Jesse’s ammonia levels were acceptable on the day of the injection. Sheryl Gay Stolberg, ‘‘FDA Officials Fault Penn Team in Gene Therapy Death,’’ New York Times, 9 December 1999, A22.
Silberner, ‘‘Gene Therapy Death,’’ 6.
Dateline transcript. A major factor in Gelsinger’s turn against Wilson
was the disclosure that Wilson’s own animal studies had resulted in
deaths, a fact never acknowledged by Wilson and the Penn researchers until the investigations following Jesse’s death. Those deaths were
precisely the ones Wilson had the greatest duty to report during the
consent process.
The actions of Wilson and the Penn researchers were investigated
from every angle after Jesse’s death, a path that ultimately led to a
legal settlement between the Gelsinger family and the University of
Pennsylvania (in 2000), a formal investigation of Wilson and Penn by
the FDA (in 1999–2000), a restructuring of priorities and practices at
Penn’s Gene Therapy Institute (in 2002), and Wilson’s dismissal as
the director of the Gene Therapy Institute (in 2002). See ‘‘Penn Settles
Suit on Gene Therapy,’’ New York Times, 4 November 2000, A18; ‘‘Family
Settles Suit over Death in Gene Therapy,’’ Wall Street Journal, 6 NovemNotes to Pages 107–108 [209]
140
141
142
143
ber 2000, B6; Gretchen Vogel, ‘‘FDA Moves against Penn Scientist,’’
Science, 15 December 2000, 2049–50; and ‘‘Penn’s Gene Therapy Director Stepping Down,’’ Gene Therapy Weekly, 23 May 2002, 7–8.
‘‘Death at the Hands of Science,’’ editorial, New York Times, 31 July 2001.
At this point the gene therapy community began hastily to revise its
claims and to recharacterize its studies, much as Crystal had done earlier. Researchers turned their attention to a new kind of scaled-down
gene therapy, labeled ‘‘gene-assist therapies’’ because the goal was to
deliver genes not to cells but to the proteins that regulate chloride
transport. As one Associated Press story noted in July 1999, ‘‘Studies
of three drugs called ‘gene assist therapies’ are in their early stages,
experts caution. But if they work . . . patients could expect more normal lives by using a daily medicine to control a genetic defect that
causes cystic fibrosis.’’ Lauran Neergaard, ‘‘Early Studies Prompt Hope
for New Way to Attack Cystic Fibrosis,’’ Associated Press, 5 July 1999
(http://www.canoe.ca/Health9907/05 cf.html), accessed 11 July 2005.
Stolberg, ‘‘Biotech Death of Jesse Gelsinger,’’ 138–39.
In mid-1995, on the advice of a panel of experts, NIH director Harold
Varmus reduced the membership of the RAC from twenty-five to fifteen and stripped it of its approval authority. Varmus argued that in
making this decision he was combating the overselling that was rife in
the field of gene therapy. He later argued that he saw the RAC as doing
its work ineffectively because it approved too many ‘‘troubling’’ protocols—that is, experiments that were not adequately peer-reviewed or
conducted with the public interest in mind. In the words of Dr. Nelson
Wivel (one of the RAC’s former executive directors and later a colleague of James Wilson at Penn), ‘‘Some days . . . it felt as though the
RAC was helping the biotech industry raise money. Dr. Varmus hated
that.’’ Others who wished to combat the overselling of gene therapy
saw Varmus’s actions regarding the RAC as self-defeating. For them,
what was needed was better regulation, not less. As Stolberg noted in
her New York Times article, Jesse Gelsinger’s death confirmed the objection voiced by Varmus’s critics, who saw his decision as allowing
‘‘gene-therapy researchers to ignore the panel and keep information
about safety to themselves.’’ Ibid., 139.
‘‘AIDS politics [had] produced strange political allies. The antiregulation Reagan/Bush administration and the gay community probably
had one interest in common: deregulating the drug approval process.’’
[210] Notes to Page 109
144
145
146
147
148
149
George Annas, ‘‘Faith (Healing), Hope, and Charity at the FDA: The
Politics of AIDS Drug Trials,’’ Villanova Law Review 34 (1989): 771–97.
There was more to the story. Drug research enterprises often perceived
safety information as proprietary and resisted sharing it. The RAC confronted this problem of nondisclosure at its September 1999 meeting
(before Jesse’s death) when its members were presented with frank
testimony from the Schering-Plough Company that information about
side effects should be classified as a trade secret and with a sixteenmonth-old letter (dated 14 May 1998) from Dr. Ronald Crystal of the
New York Hospital and Cornell Medical Center asking that information about a patient death in one of his gene therapy trials be kept
confidential. ‘‘The premise of the RAC review process from its inception was that all nonproprietary details about the protocol itself and
all adverse events would be publicly reported,’’ said Dr. LeRoy Walters,
‘‘and in a timely way.’’ Sheryl Gay Stolberg, ‘‘U.S. Panel Moves to Force
Disclosure in Genetic Testing,’’ New York Times, 30 October 1999. In
December 1999 a spokesperson for Schering-Plough, a company with
several gene therapy trials in progress, commented that ‘‘immediate
disclosure of adverse outcomes is bad science.’’ See Rick Weiss, ‘‘Gene
Therapy Firms Resist Publicity: U.S. Regulators, Researchers Are Divided on Releasing Information on Adverse Effects,’’ Washington Post,
11 December 1999, A2.
Michael Schechter, Brent Shelton, Peter Margolis, and Stacey Fitzsimmons, ‘‘The Association of Socioeconomic Status with Outcomes in
Cystic Fibrosis Patients in the United States,’’ American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine 163 (2001): 1331–37, at 1336.
Patricia Brennan, ‘‘His Daughter’s Legacy: ‘Alex, The Life of a Child,’’’
Washington Post, 20 April 1986, TV Tab, 5.
Leah Y. Latimer, ‘‘Arlington Nazi Says Party Plans Shift to Midwest,’’
Washington Post, 25 December 1982, B1.
V. Scotet, D. Barton, J. Watson, M. Audrezet, T. McDevitt, S. McQuaid,
C. Shortt, M. De Braekeleer, C. Ferec, and C. Le Marechal, ‘‘Comparison of the CFTR Mutation Spectrum in Three Cohorts of Patients of
Celtic Origin from Brittany (France) and Ireland,’’ Human Mutation 22
(July 2003): 105.
Rick Weiss, ‘‘The Good, the Bad, and the Unknown: Scientists Find
That Some Genes Aren’t Evil, They’re Just Misunderstood,’’ Washington
Post, 11 October 1994, Z7.
Notes to Pages 109–113 [211]
150 Ellen Lee, ‘‘On the Front Lines against Cystic Fibrosis,’’ Atlanta Journal
and Constitution, 23 August 1998, 04C. See also Tim Friend, ‘‘Treatment
of Cystic Fibrosis on the Fast Track,’’ USA Today, 14 April 1998, D7: ‘‘CF
is the most common fatal, inherited disease among whites, affecting
30,000 children and young adults in the USA.’’
151 Jane E. Brody, ‘‘Scientists Plot Tactics to Outmaneuver Cystic Fibrosis
Gene,’’ New York Times, 14 January 2003, A5.
152 Peg Meier, ‘‘Playing for Life,’’ Minnesota Star Tribune, 1 November 1995,
E1.
chapter 3. a perilous lottery for the black family
1 Hugh Chaplin, Lenabell: A Doctor’s Memoir of a Remarkable Woman’s Eighty
Year Battle with Sickle Cell Disease (Philadelphia: Xlibris Corporation,
2003), 176, 77.
2 James Jones, Bad Blood: The Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment (New York: Free
Press, 1981); Susan Reverby, ed., Tuskegee’s Truths: Rethinking the Tuskegee
Syphilis Study (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2000).
3 See Keith Wailoo, Dying in the City of the Blues: Sickle Cell Anemia and the Politics of Race and Health (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press,
2001). Today, scientists appear much more circumspect about using
race as a marker of biological variation. Luigi Luca Cavalli-Sforza, who
first began work as a population geneticist in the 1940s, has recently
argued that the examples of sickle cell disease and thalassemia demonstrate not only the principles of the ‘‘heterozygote advantage’’ but
also the impossibility of ‘‘racial purity’’ or a truly homogenous population. Luigi Luca Cavalli-Sforza, Genes, Peoples, and Language (Berkeley
and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 2000), 46–49.
4 Wailoo, Dying in the City of the Blues.
5 Keith Wailoo, ‘‘Inventing the Heterozygote: Molecular Biology, Racial
Identity, and the Narratives of Sickle Cell Disease, Tay Sachs, and Cystic Fibrosis,’’ in Race, Nature, and the Politics of Difference, ed. Donald
Moore, Jake Kosek, and Anand Pandian (Durham: Duke University
Press, 2003), 235–53.
6 Wailoo, Dying in the City of the Blues.
7 Dr. Michael Blaese, chief of the National Cancer Institute’s cellular immunology section, quoted in ‘‘Gene Therapy May Save Kids,’’ St. Petersburg (Florida) Times, 18 May 1993, A1.
[212] Notes to Pages 113–121
8 Bill Deitrich, ‘‘Genetics: Finding Genes Doesn’t Assure Cures,’’ Seattle
Times, 6 April 1993, F1.
9 Stuart Edelstein, The Sickled Cell: From Myths to Molecules (Cambridge,
Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1986). See also Simon Feldman and
Alfred Tauber, ‘‘Sickle Cell Anemia: Reexamining the First ‘Molecular
Disease,’’’ Bulletin of the History of Medicine 71 (winter 1997): 623–50.
10 Linus Pauling, Harvey Itano, S. J. Singer, and Ibert Wells, ‘‘Sickle Cell
Anemia, a Molecular Disease,’’ Science 110 (November 1949): 543–48.
11 Keith Wailoo, ‘‘Detecting ‘Negro Blood’: Black and White Identities
and the Reconstruction of Sickle Cell Anemia,’’ in Drawing Blood: Technology and Disease Identity in Twentieth-Century America (Baltimore: Johns
Hopkins University Press, 1997).
12 George Gray, ‘‘Sickle Cell Anemia,’’ Scientific American 185 (August 1951):
56–59, at 59.
13 Wailoo, Dying in the City of the Blues.
14 Paul McCurdy quoted in Nancy Hicks, ‘‘Report of Treatment for Sickle
Cell Anemia Evokes Guarded Optimism from Researchers on Disease,’’
New York Times, 1 December 1970, 21. For the first report on urea, see
Robert Nalbandian et al., ‘‘Sickle Cell Crisis Terminated by Use of Urea
in Invert Sugar in Two Cases,’’ U.S. Army Medical Research Lab 896 (17 September 1970).
15 ‘‘Discriminating Disease,’’ Time, 21 December 1970, 41.
16 ‘‘Sickle Cell Cure—The Promise, The Peril: Urea Combats Crisis of Disease but Causes Dehydration,’’ Medical World News, 8 January 1971.
17 Frank Gardner and Walter Seegers quoted in ibid. Reprinted in Congressional Quarterly, 8 October 1971, S167086.
18 Nancy Hicks, ‘‘Blood Cell Sickling Is Inhibited in Laboratory Tests,’’
New York Times, 28 May 1971, 38.
19 Paul McCurdy and Laviza Mahmood, ‘‘Intravenous Urea Treatment of
the Painful Crisis of Sickle Cell Anemia,’’ New England Journal of Medicine 285 (28 October 1971): 994.
20 George Segel et al., ‘‘Effects of Urea and Cyanate on Sickling in Vitro,’’
New England Journal of Medicine 287 (13 July 1972): 59–64. In a later letter
one researcher pointed to the failure of urea in dramatic terms: ‘‘Not
only were the crises not ameliorated but the diuresis produced within
a 20-hour period was massive, leading to excretion of 12,000 to 22,000
ml of urine. If the treatment team had not been alerted to this posNotes to Pages 122–128 [213]
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
sible fluid loss, the patients could have become acutely dehydrated.’’
Jerome Brody, ‘‘Treatment of Sickle-Cell Crises,’’ New England Journal of
Medicine 287 (21 September 1972): 616.
B. H. Lubin and F. A. Oski, ‘‘Oral Urea Therapy in Children with Sickle
Cell Anemia,’’ Journal of Pediatrics 82 (February 1973): 311–13.
Nancy Hicks, ‘‘Two Studies Discount Urea as Sickle Cell Treatment,’’
New York Times, 28 May 1974, 52.
Gray, ‘‘Sickle Cell Anemia,’’ 59.
Richard Nixon, ‘‘Health Message,’’ 18 February 1971, Congressional Quarterly Almanac 27 (February 1971): 37A–38A.
Luis Barreras and Lemuel Diggs, ‘‘Sodium Citrate Orally for Painful
Sickle Cell Crises,’’ Journal of the American Medical Association 215 (1 February 1971): 768.
Paul Gillette et al., ‘‘Sodium Cyanate as a Potential Treatment for
Sickle-Cell Disease,’’ New England Journal of Medicine 290 (21 March
1974): 659.
Anthony Cerami and Charles Peterson, ‘‘Cyanate and Sickle-Cell Disease,’’ Scientific American 232 (April 1975): 50.
‘‘The dazzling demonstration of scientific amenities in these articles
may divert the reader from serious defects,’’ he wrote. He then criticized the urea trials for ‘‘seven critically important violations of our
protocol.’’ Robert Nalbandian, letter, ‘‘Urea and the Sickle Cell Crisis,’’
Journal of the American Medical Association 229 (2 September 1974): 1285.
Paul McCurdy, letter, ‘‘Sickle Cell Crisis and Urea,’’ Journal of the American Medical Association 230 (9 December 1974): 1386.
Statement by Senator John Tunney of California, Congressional Record,
8 October 1971, S16080.
Barbara Culliton,’’Cooley’s Anemia: Special Treatment for Another
Ethnic Disease,’’ Science 178 (10 November 1972): 590–93.
William Hines, ‘‘Sickle Cell Anemia: A Stylish Disease,’’ Memphis Commercial Appeal, 11 November 1971, quoted in Wailoo, Dying in the City of
the Blues, 193.
Linus Pauling, ‘‘Reflections on a New Biology: Foreword,’’ UCLA Law
Review 15 (1968): 269, quoted in Wailoo, Dying in the City of the Blues, 186.
I. M. Klotz et al., ‘‘Rational Approaches to Chemotherapy: Antisickling
Agents,’’ Science 213 (August 1981): 724–31; Thomas Maugh III, ‘‘Sickle
Cell (II): Many Agents Near Trials,’’ Science 211 (30 January 1981): 468–
70.
[214] Notes to Pages 128–131
35 C. M. Peterson et al., ‘‘Iron Metabolism, Sickle Cell Disease, and Response of Cyanate,’’ Blood 46 (October 1975): 583–90; Samuel Charache and W. Gordon Walker, ‘‘Failure of Desmopressin to Lower
Serum Sodium or Prevent Crisis in Patients with Sickle Cell Anemia,’’
Blood 58 (November 1981): 892–96.
36 ‘‘Desickling Cells with a Kidney Machine,’’ Science News 114 (23 September 1978); ‘‘Benzyl Esters as a Desickling Drug,’’ Science News 117
(16 February 1980); Klotz et al., ‘‘Rational Approaches to Chemotherapy’’; S. Takashima and T. Asakura, ‘‘Desickling of Sickled Erythrocytes by Pulsed Radio-Frequency Field,’’ Science 220 (22 April 1983):
411–13.
37 Maugh, ‘‘Sickle Cell (II),’’ 470.
38 S. Charache and M. Moyer, ‘‘Treatment of Patients with Sickle Cell
Anemia: Another View,’’ Progress in Clinical and Biological Research 98
(1982): 73–82.
39 ‘‘Penicillin Found to Aid in Treating Cell Disorder,’’ New York Times,
19 June 1986, A19. The article refers to M. H. Gaston et al., ‘‘Prophylaxis with Oral Penicillin in Children with Sickle Cell Anemia: A Randomized Trial,’’ New England Journal of Medicine 314 (1986): 593–99.
40 ‘‘Seeking New Blood to Stop Sickle Cell’’ (profile of Dr. Clarice Reid),
Black Enterprise, October 1988, 66.
41 C. H. Pegelow et al., ‘‘Experience with the Use of Prophylactic Penicillin in Children with Sickle Cell Anemia,’’ Journal of Pediatrics 118 (May
1991): 736–38, at 738.
42 Zora Rogers and George Buchanan, ‘‘Bacteremia in Children with
Sickle Hemoglobin C Disease and Sickle Beta+-Thalassemia: Is Prophylactic Penicillin Necessary?’’ Journal of Pediatrics 127 (September
1995): 353.
43 Ibid. The authors noted, ‘‘Careful evaluation of febrile episodes of
all patients with SC disease is necessary regardless of the age of the
patient or the use of prophylactic penicillin therapy.’’ See also P. Applebaum, ‘‘Antimicrobial Resistance in Streptococcus pneumoniae: An Overview,’’ Clinical Infectious Diseases 15 (1992): 77–83; I. R. Friedlander and
G. H. McCracken, ‘‘Management of Infections Caused by AntibioticResistant Streptococcus pneumoniae,’’ New England Journal of Medicine 331
(1994): 377–82; and P. J. Chesney, ‘‘The Escalating Problem of Antimicrobial Resistance in Streptococcus pneumoniae,’’ American Journal of the
Diseases of Children 146 (August 1992): 912–16.
Notes to Pages 131–137 [215]
44 W. Wang, ‘‘Antibiotic-Resistant Pneumococcal Infection in Children
with Sickle Cell Disease in the United States,’’ Journal of Pediatric
Hematology/Oncology 18 (May 1996): 140–44. See also P. J. Chesney,
‘‘Penicillin- and Cephalosporin-Resistant Strains of Streptococcus pneumoniae Causing Sepsis and Meningitis in Children with Sickle Cell Disease,’’ Journal of Pediatrics 127 (October 1995): 536–42.
45 J. M. Falletta et al., ‘‘Discontinuing Penicillin Prophylaxis in Children
with Sickle Cell Anemia: Prophylactic Penicillin Study II,’’ Journal of
Pediatrics 127 (November 1995): 689, 690.
46 R. F. Holcombe and J. Griffin, ‘‘Effect of Insurance on Pain Medication Prescriptions in a Hematology/Oncology Practice,’’ Southern Medical Journal 86 (February 1993): 151–56.
47 L. Williams et al., ‘‘Outpatient Therapy with Ceftriaxone and Oral Cefixime for Selected Febrile Children with Sickle Cell Disease,’’ Journal
of Pediatric Hematology/Oncology 18 (August 1996): 257–61. See also J. A.
Wilimas, ‘‘A Randomized Study of Outpatient Treatment with Ceftriaxone for Selected Febrile Children with Sickle Cell Disease,’’ New England Journal of Medicine 329 (12 August 1993): 472–76: ‘‘When the randomized group were compared, outpatient treatment saved a mean of
$1,195 per febrile episode . . . With the use of conservative eligibility
criteria, at least half the febrile episodes in children with sickle cell
disease can be treated safely on an outpatient basis, with substantial
reductions in cost’’ (475).
48 Charache and Moyer, ‘‘Treatment of Patients with Sickle Cell Anemia,’’ 81.
49 ‘‘Counterattack on a Killer—Blacks Fight to End Tragic Toll of Sickle
Cell Anemia,’’ Ebony, October 1971, 85.
50 On the phenomenology of pain, its resistance to objective study, and
its cultural significance, see Mary S. Sheridan, Pain in America (Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 1992); Roselyne Rey, The History of
Pain (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1993); Elaine Scarry,
The Body in Pain: The Making and Unmaking of the World (New York: Oxford
University Press, 1985); and Martin Pernick, A Calculus of Suffering: Pain,
Professionalism, and Anesthesia in Nineteenth-Century America (New York:
Columbia University Press, 1985).
51 E. Vichinsky et al., ‘‘Multidisciplinary Approach to Pain Management
in Sickle Cell Disease,’’ American Journal of Pediatric Hematology/Oncology 4
[216] Notes to Pages 137–140
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
(fall 1982): 328–33; Orah Platt et al., ‘‘Pain in Sickle Cell Disease: Rates
and Risk Factors,’’ New England Journal of Medicine 325 (4 July 1991): 11–
16.
Orah Platt, ‘‘Easing the Suffering Caused by Sickle Cell Disease,’’ New
England Journal of Medicine 330 (17 March 1994): 783.
Elisabeth Rosenthal, ‘‘The Pain Game,’’ Discover, November 1993, 54–
57. See also Loch Adamson, ‘‘Sickle-Cell Patients Seek Respect,’’ Bronx
Beat Online, 6 November 1996, a discussion with researcher Ronald
Nagel about the issues revolving around SCD pain management (http:
//www.columbia.edu/cu/bb/sickle.html), accessed 11 July 2005. Episodes of the NBC television series ER have also highlighted the blurring of the line between SCD patients and ‘‘drug addicts.’’ See ‘‘You
Are Here’’ (season 11, episode 177870), 5 May 2005, and ‘‘Obstruction
of Justice’’ (season 4, episode 466359), 11 December 1997.
Rosenthal, ‘‘Pain Game.’’
‘‘Seeking New Blood to Stop Sickle Cell,’’ 66.
‘‘Switch on Genes,’’ Newsweek, 20 December 1982, 85.
‘‘Genetic Fix: Turning on Fetal DNA,’’ Time, 20 December 1982, 72.
A. Bank, D. Markowitz, and N. Lerner, ‘‘Gene Transfer: A Potential Approach to Gene Therapy for Sickle Cell Disease,’’ Annals of the New York
Academy of Science 565 (1989): 37–43, at 37.
Charles Whitten quoted in Marian Segal, ‘‘New Hope for Children with
Sickle Cell Disease,’’ FDA Consumer, March 1989, 14–19, at 19.
The first two statements by Charache appear in ‘‘Scientists Cite Gains
on Sickle Cell Disease,’’ New York Times, 28 November 1989, C1, C6. The
third statement by Charache appears in Charles Marwick, ‘‘Sickle Cell
Problems Continue to Challenge Medical Science, but Some Progress
Noted,’’ Journal of the American Medical Association 263 (1990): 493.
‘‘A Switch for Sickle Cells,’’ U.S. News and World Report, 23 April 1990;
‘‘Sickle Cell Breakthrough: New Drugs Quell Symptoms,’’ American
Health, May 1990, 16. See also ‘‘Waking up Genes: A Flavor Enhancer
May Provide the First Treatment for Sickle Cell Anemia,’’ Time, 25 January 1993, 23.
Griffin Rodgers, ‘‘Recent Approaches to the Treatment of SCA,’’ Journal of the American Medical Association, 24 April 1991, 66.
E. P. Vichinsky and B. H. Lubin, ‘‘A Cautionary Note Regarding Hydroxyurea in Sickle Cell Disease,’’ Blood 83 (15 February 1994): 1124–28.
Notes to Pages 140–145 [217]
64 Samuel Charache, ‘‘Experimental Therapy on Sickle Cell Disease: Use
of Hydroxyurea,’’ American Journal of Pediatric Hematology/Oncology 16
(1994): 62–66, at 66.
65 Charache quoted in Warren Leary, ‘‘Sickle Cell Trial Called Success,
Halted Early,’’ New York Times, 31 January 1995, C1, C7.
66 Ron Winslow, ‘‘Technology and Health: Sickle Cell Anemia Pain
Curbed Dramatically by Drug, Study Says,’’ Wall Street Journal, 31 January 1995, B6.
67 Griffin Rodgers and Alan N. Schechter, ‘‘Sickle Cell Anemia: Basic Research Reaches the Clinic,’’ New England Journal of Medicine 332 (18 May
1995): 1372–73.
68 Samuel Charache, ‘‘Experimental Therapy,’’ Hematology/Oncology Clinics
of North America 10 (December 1996): 1376.
69 ‘‘Winning the Lottery: Odds Are against It,’’ editorial, St. Louis PostDispatch, 2 May 1992, B3.
70 ‘‘Marrow Transplant Found to Be a Cure in Sickle Cell Case,’’ New York
Times, 20 September 1984.
71 R. B. Scott, ‘‘Advances in the Treatment of Sickle Cell Disease in Children,’’ American Journal of the Diseases of Children 139 (1985): 1219–22.
72 R. E. Hardy and E. V. Ikpeazu, ‘‘Bone Marrow Transplantation: A Review,’’ Journal of the National Medical Association 81 (1989): 518–23, at 518.
73 F. T. Billings, ‘‘Treatment of Sickle Cell Anemia with Bone Marrow
Transplantation: Pros and Cons,’’ Transactions of the American Clinical and
Climatological Association 101 (1989): 8–19; Ronald Nagel, ‘‘The Dilemma
of Marrow Transplantation in Sickle Cell Anemia,’’ Seminars in Hematology 28 (July 1991): 233–34; E. Donnall Thomas, ‘‘The Pros and Cons
of Bone Marrow Transplantation for Sickle Cell Anemia,’’ Seminars in
Hematology 28 (July 1991): 260–62.
74 Sergio Piomelli, ‘‘Sickle Cell Disease in the 1990s: The Need for Active
and Preventive Intervention,’’ Seminars in Hematology 28 (July 1991):
227–31.
75 Nagel, ‘‘Dilemma of Marrow Transplantation.’’
76 Ernest Beutler, ‘‘Bone Marrow Transplantation for Sickle Cell Anemia:
Summarizing Comments,’’ Seminars in Hematology 28 (July 1991): 263–
67.
77 Thomas, ‘‘Pros and Cons of Bone Marrow Transplantation.’’
78 Nagel, ‘‘Dilemma of Marrow Transplantation.’’
79 Ibid.
[218] Notes to Pages 145–153
80 Eric Kodish et al., ‘‘Bone Marrow Transplantation for Sickle Cell Disease,’’ New England Journal of Medicine 325 (7 November 1991): 1349–53.
81 O. S. Platt and E. C. Guinan, ‘‘Bone Marrow Transplantation in Sickle
Cell Anemia: The Dilemma of Choice,’’ New England Journal of Medicine
335 (8 August 1996): 426–27.
82 Susan Miller, ‘‘A Cure for Sickle Cell?’’ Newsweek, 19 August 1996, 64.
See also Curtis Rist and Cindy Dampier, ‘‘A Life Now Worth Living,’’
People, 11 November 1996, 201–2.
83 Charache, ‘‘Experimental Therapy,’’ 1375.
84 Richard Carter, ‘‘Insurance Coverage and Bone Marrow Transplants,’’
BMT Newsletter, May 1994. See also M. C. Walters et al., ‘‘Barriers to
Bone Marrow Transplantation for Sickle Cell Anemia,’’ Biology of Blood
and Marrow Transplantation 2 (May 1996): 100–104. The authors point
out that ‘‘among 4848 patients less than 16 years of age . . . 315 (6.5%)
patients were reported to meet protocol entry criteria for transplantation . . . [and in this eligibility, there was] wide variation among the
[22] institutions . . . [Among the 315 eligible,] 128 (41%) had HLA typing performed, and of these 44 (14% of those meeting the criteria) had
an HLA-identical sibling.’’ See additionally W. C. Mentzer et al., ‘‘Availability of Related Donors for Bone Marrow Transplantation in Sickle
Cell Anemia,’’ American Journal of Pediatric Hematology/Oncology 16 (February 1994): 27–29.
85 Charache, ‘‘Experimental Therapy,’’ 1375.
86 Mentzer et al., ‘‘Availability of Related Donors,’’ 29.
87 ‘‘Although some knowledge may be gained from offering transplantation to patients with sickle cell disease,’’ noted one group of researchers, ‘‘we suggest that the use of transplantation for patients with sickle
cell disease is not primarily a matter of research.’’ Kodish et al., ‘‘Bone
Marrow Transplantation,’’ 1353.
88 Bank, Markowitz, and Lerner, ‘‘Gene Transfer,’’ 42. In the same year
(1989) another senior researcher in the field looked ‘‘to the proliferating scientific energy and money going into gene therapy research for
the payoff in sickle cell treatment,’’ which he characterized as ‘‘the
ultimate therapy.’’ Charles Whitten quoted in Segal, ‘‘New Hope for
Children with Sickle Cell Disease,’’ 19.
89 David Nathan, ‘‘Clinical Care—Sickle Cell Disease: Past, Present, and
Future,’’ paper presented at the National Sickle Cell Disease Conference, ‘‘Keeping the Promise of Treatment and Cure,’’ 19 September
Notes to Pages 155–158 [219]
1997, Washington, D.C. He continued, ‘‘Another problem is that one
has to get the transfecting stem cells, and create real repopulating capacity.’’ Only two years before, Nathan had published a triumphant assessment of the ‘‘tremendous accomplishments and potential of the
American biomedical research enterprise,’’ focusing on the story of a
young boy with thalassemia. David G. Nathan, Genes, Blood, and Courage: A Boy Called Immortal Sword (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University
Press, 1995).
90 Gail Ross et al., ‘‘Gene Therapy in the United States: A Five-Year Status
Report,’’ Human Gene Therapy 7 (10 September 1996): 1781–90. Between
1989 and December 1997, there were no clinical trials in SCD. In CF
during the same period, there were nineteen worldwide (fourteen in
the United States and five elsewhere). See Human Gene Therapy 8 (10 December 1997): 301–38.
91 Chaplin, Lenabell, 176.
conclusion. dreams amid diversity
1 Anderson quoted in Leon Jaroff and Hannah Bloch, ‘‘Keys to the Kingdom,’’ Time 148, no. 14, Fall 1996 Special Issue, 24–29, at 28; Collins
quoted in Jean Seligmann, ‘‘Curing Cystic Fibrosis? Genes Convert Sick
Cells,’’ Newsweek, 1 October 1990, 64.
2 Allen Buchanan, Dan W. Brock, Norman Daniels, and Daniel Wikler,
From Chance to Choice: Genetics and Justice (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2000), 61.
3 Kaback quoted in Tim Cornwell, ‘‘Jewish Marriage Makers Embrace
Testing for Genetic Disease,’’ London Guardian, 6 March 1994, 27.
4 Max Weber, The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, trans. Talcott
Parsons (London: Harper Collins, 1991), 182. This edition was originally published in 1930. Weber’s text first appeared as a two-part article
in 1904–5.
5 Keith Wailoo, Dying in the City of the Blues: Sickle Cell Anemia and the Politics of Race and Health (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press,
2001).
6 E. Donnall Thomas, ‘‘The Pros and Cons of Bone Marrow Transplantation for Sickle Cell Anemia,’’ Seminars in Hematology 28 (July 1991):
260–62.
7 Frank Deford, Alex: The Life of a Child (New York: Viking, 1983), 32.
[220] Notes to Pages 158–165
8 Carl Elliott, Better Than Well: American Medicine Meets the American Dream
(New York: W. W. Norton, 2003).
9 Sheryl Stolberg, ‘‘Gene Therapy on Newborn Sets Medical Precedent,’’
Houston Chronicle, 16 May 1993, 2; ‘‘Gene Therapy May Save Kids,’’ St.
Petersburg Times, 18 May 1993, A1; ‘‘Heading off Genetic Diseases in
Their Infancy,’’ USA Today, 18 May 1993, D1; Michael Drexler, ‘‘A Cure
of Cystic Fibrosis? Rainbow [Children’s Hospital] Cheers New Gene
Therapy,’’ Cleveland Plain Dealer, 16 October 1993, 1B.
10 Gerald Grob, The Deadly Truth: A History of Disease in America (Cambridge,
Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2002).
11 Bill Dietrich, ‘‘Genetic Research Escalates—But Locating Flaws Can Be
a Long Way from Curing Disease,’’ Seattle Times, 10 April 1993, A6; Tim
Radford, ‘‘Code of Conduct: The So-Called Homosexual Gene Highlights the Dramatic Advance in DNA Research. It Can Save Lives and
Alleviate Suffering but It Also Poses Huge Ethical Problems,’’ London
Guardian, 21 July 1993, 2.
12 ‘‘Gene Therapy May Save Kids,’’ A1.
13 Christopher Feudtner, Bittersweet: Diabetes, Insulin, and the Transformation of Illness (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2003);
Steven Peitzman, ‘‘From Bright’s Disease to End-Stage Renal Disease,’’
in Framing Disease: Studies in Cultural History, ed. Charles Rosenberg and
Janet Golden (New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 1992), 3–19;
Richard A. Rettig and Norman G. Levinsky, eds., Kidney Failure and the
Federal Government (Washington, D.C.: National Academy Press, 1991);
Alonzo Plough, Borrowed Time: Artificial Organs and the Politics of Extending
Life (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1986).
14 ‘‘Worcester Firm a Step Closer to Finding a Gene Therapy: Emerging
Business,’’ Boston Globe, 29 August 1993, 78; Victoria Griffith, ‘‘A Market That Could Spiral: The Commercial Opportunities of Gene Therapy
Are Growing by the Minute,’’ Financial Times, 1 July 1993, 20; Alex Barnum, ‘‘Biotech Startup Gets Genentech’s Backing: South S.F. Firm to
Take 20% Stake in GenVec,’’ San Francisco Chronicle, 4 March 1993, D2.
15 Paul Donohue, ‘‘Gene Therapy Offers Promise in Future for Sickle Cell
Anemia,’’ St. Louis Post-Dispatch, 28 October 1998, E2.
16 Jay Ingram, ‘‘Tracking the Travels of a Gene,’’ Toronto Star, 8 March
1998, F8.
17 ‘‘FDA Suspends Gene Therapy Work,’’ Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, 4 May
Notes to Pages 165–170 [221]
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
2005, A6; Sharon Begley, ‘‘Why Gene Therapy Still Hasn’t Produced
Major Breakthroughs,’’ Wall Street Journal, 18 February 2005, B1; Michael
White, ‘‘Gene Genie Stays in Bottle,’’ Weekend Australian, 20 November
2004, B12 (a review of His Brother’s Keeper, a book about the hope and
disappointments of gene therapy for a patient with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis); Robert Matthews, ‘‘Gene Therapy Is Just an Expensive
Myth, Claims Scientist,’’ London Sunday Telegraph, 31 October 2004, O8.
Robin Marantz Henig, ‘‘Genome in Black and White (and Gray),’’ New
York Times, 10 October 2004, sec. 6, p. 47.
Quoted in John Pope, ‘‘Heart Drug Study Triggers Questions: Test Results Promising for African-Americans,’’ New Orleans Times-Picayune, 16
November 2004, 1.
Henig, ‘‘Genome in Black and White (and Gray),’’ sec. 6, p. 47.
Andrew Pollack, ‘‘Drug Approved for Heart Failure in Black Patients,’’
New York Times, 20 July 2004, C1. Sociologist Troy Duster argued that
the marketing of the drug had begun with the idea of a study focusing
on only one group, an idea that Duster saw as ‘‘flawed from the very
beginning . . . You can’t just do a study on a single group. That’s basic
statistics.’’ Quoted in David Kohn, ‘‘Drug Combination Reduces Heart
Failure Deaths of Blacks: Research Targeted by Race Stirs Ethical and
Scientific Questions,’’ Baltimore Sun, 9 November 2004, A1.
Quoted in Pope, ‘‘Heart Drug Study Triggers Questions,’’ 1.
January W. Payne, ‘‘A Cure for a Race? Heart Drug Findings Set off
Ethics Debate,’’ Washington Post, 16 November 2004, F1.
Frank Harris III, ‘‘ ‘Black’ Drug for Heart Baffles the Mind,’’ Hartford
Courant, 15 November 2004, A9.
M. Gregg Bloche quoted in Pope, ‘‘Heart Drug Study Triggers Questions,’’ 1. See also M. G. Bloche, ‘‘Race-Based Therapeutics,’’ editorial,
New England Journal of Medicine 351 (2004): 2035–37.
[222] Notes to Pages 171–173
glossary
abortion. See selective abortion and therapeutic abortion.
adenovirus. Any of a group of DNA-carrying viruses that causes
conjunctivitis and upper respiratory tract infections (the common
cold). In their attempts at ‘‘gene therapy,’’ scientists have attempted to
alter adenoviruses (so-named because they were first identified in
adenoid tissue) to deliver specific genes to diseased parts of the body.
See gene therapy.
amaurosis. Partial or complete loss of eyesight, especially in the absence
of externally perceptible changes in the eye.
amniocentesis testing. A medical procedure used for prenatal diagnosis
of disease. A small amount of amniotic fluid surrounding a
developing fetus is drawn out of the uterus through a needle inserted
into the pregnant woman’s abdomen. The fluid may be analyzed to
determine the sex of the fetus or to detect genetic abnormalities. The
procedure is usually performed in the sixteenth week of pregnancy.
Contrast chorionic villi sampling.
antibiotic. An organic substance, such as penicillin or streptomycin, that
destroys or inhibits the growth of pathogenic (infection- or diseasecausing) microorganisms. Antibiotics are themselves produced from
certain fungi, bacteria, and other microorganisms. An antibiotic that
is effective against a specific or limited range of pathogenic
microorganisms is called a narrow spectrum antibiotic. Conversely, a wide
spectrum antibiotic is effective against a broad range of pathogenic
microorganisms.
Ashkenazic Jews or Ashkenazim. Jewish people of originally Yiddishspeaking, Eastern European ancestry. The Ashkenazim are one of the
major ethnic divisions among Jews, and their ranks are often said to
include Jews from Germany, France, and Central Europe as well as
Eastern Europe. Most Jews living in the United States are
Ashkenazim. See also Sephardic Jews.
autosomal dominant inheritance. Pattern of hereditary transmission in
which only one parent need pass the gene in order for the trait to
express itself in the offspring. Thus, if a child receives a gene that is
dominant (from either parent), he or she will usually manifest the
trait. If that gene is abnormal, the child will have the disease. A child
conceived by an affected individual has a 50 percent chance of
inheriting the abnormal copy of the gene (or inheriting the disorder)
and a 50 percent chance of inheriting the normal copy of the gene (or
not inheriting the disorder). Autosomal dominant disorders can occur
in multiple generations in a family or affect multiple family members
in the same generation, and they never skip a generation. Except
when there has been a new spontaneous mutation, every individual
affected by a dominant gene disorder has an affected parent.
autosomal dominant disorder, gene, or trait. See autosomal dominant
inheritance and autosomal inheritance.
autosomal inheritance. Pattern of hereditary transmission in which the
expression of a trait is independent of the sex characteristics of the
offspring. Humans have twenty-three pairs of chromosomes: twentytwo autosomes and one pair of sex chromosomes. Genes located on
the autosomes can be dominant or recessive. Each parent passes only
one copy of every gene to a child. By definition, autosomal disorders
affect male and female offspring equally. Contrast X-linked
inheritance.
autosomal recessive inheritance. Pattern of hereditary transmission in
which both parents need pass the gene in order for the trait to express
itself in the offspring. Thus, if a child receives a gene that is recessive
(from one parent and not the other), there is usually no visible
evidence of the trait. If that recessive gene is abnormal, it will not
manifest as a disorder as long as the individual possesses another
functioning copy of that gene. When both copies of the recessive gene
are abnormal, the genetic defect will typically manifest as disease.
Couples who both have an autosomal recessive defect face a 25
percent chance that their future child will have the disorder, a 25
percent chance that the child will be normal, and a 50 percent chance
that the child will be a carrier (will have one normal gene, one
abnormal gene). Tay-Sachs disease, cystic fibrosis, and sickle cell
disease are all autosomal recessive disorders.
autosomal recessive disorder, gene, or trait. See autosomal inheritance
and autosomal recessive inheritance.
beta-hexosaminidase deficiency. An enzyme deficiency associated with a
wide range of disorders. The enzyme occurs in two forms, beta[224] Glossary
hexosaminidase A and B. A deficiency of the former type, called a
Hex-A deficiency, leads to Tay-Sachs disease. See Tay-Sachs disease.
blood-brain barrier. A natural barrier in the human body that prevents
many substances present in the bloodstream from entering the brain
(or affecting the central nervous system). Blood vessels throughout
the body allow many molecules to cross through to tissue, but the
dense construction of the vessels in the head guards against brain
entry. Blood gases such as oxygen and small nutritional molecules can
make it through this natural barrier. However, the barrier is designed
to exclude toxins and other harmful substances from entering the
brain’s pristine nerve cell habitat. From a therapeutic perspective, the
barrier also prevents many potentially beneficial substances from
entering the brain. Enzyme replacement therapies and experimental
gene therapies are among those treatments that must overcome the
natural blood-brain barrier if they are to correct a genetic condition
involving the neurological system (e.g., Tay-Sachs disease). See
enzyme replacement therapy, gene therapy, and Tay-Sachs disease.
bone marrow transplantation (BMT). A procedure intended to replace
diseased or damaged bone marrow with healthy bone marrow.
Existing bone marrow is deliberately destroyed by high doses of
chemotherapy and/or radiation therapy before the new marrow is
implanted. The replacement marrow must come from the patient (as
in the treatment of certain cancers), from an identical twin, or from a
donor who is not an identical twin but whose marrow provides a
biological match. Most bone marrow transplants involve donors who
are not twins.
BRCA1 and BRCA2. Genes discovered in 1994 and 1995 that are associated
with increased risk of breast cancer. Jewish women of Ashkenazic
ancestry are often said to be at high risk for breast cancer because
they have a higher incidence of BRCA1 and BRCA2 genes than the
larger population of women. BRCA genes are autosomal dominant.
However, the disease (breast cancer) manifests only if both copies of
the gene are abnormal. Normally, BRCA genes regulate cell growth and
suppress tumor cells. One need inherit only a single abnormal copy of
a BRCA gene to be at increased risk for breast cancer and to be
considered a carrier. Scientists have theorized that breast cancer
occurs in a carrier of an abnormal BRCA gene when that person’s
Glossary [225]
other, otherwise normal, BRCA gene undergoes a mutation in the
cell—at which point the individual’s breast cell possesses no
functional copy of the BRCA gene to suppress tumor growth. See
autosomal inheritance and autosomal dominant inheritance.
carrier. In the context of genetic or hereditary diseases, someone who
possesses a potentially disease-causing trait in his or her
chromosomal DNA. In the case of autosomal recessive traits (like the
genes for Tay-Sachs disease, cystic fibrosis, and sickle cell disease),
carriers do not themselves have the disease. See autosomal
inheritance and autosomal recessive inheritance.
cerebral sphingolipidosis. One among several lipid (fat) storage
disorders. This disease affects the brain and is characterized by failure
to break down sphingolipids (lipids synthesized in the golgi
complex).
chorionic villi sampling (CVS). A prenatal test in which a catheter or thin
needle is inserted into the womb to extract some of the chorionic villi
(tissue from the developing placenta). The chorionic villi is composed
of cells that develop from the same fertilized egg cell as the fetus, and
thus shares the same chromosomal DNA as the fetus. CVS can be
performed in a doctor’s office or hospital between the tenth and
twelfth weeks of pregnancy. Contrast amniocentesis.
Cooley’s anemia. An inherited blood disease characterized by the absence
of normal hemoglobin and by severe anemia, enlargement of the
heart, spleen, and liver, and skeletal deformations. This disease is a
form of thalassemia, sometimes called thalassemia major, and is usually
fatal.
cystic fibrosis (CF). An autosomal recessive disease characterized by a
cluster of symptoms including high levels of electrolytes in the sweat,
pancreatic insufficiency, digestive problems, cirrhosis of the liver,
infertility (in males), and an accumulation of thick mucus in the
lungs accompanied by frequent infections and tissue scarring. There
may also be damage to the right side of the heart because it is
subjected to increased pressure as it attempts to pump blood through
the damaged lungs. CF was originally called cystic fibrosis of the pancreas.
See also electrolytes, mucoviscidosis.
DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid). The material in the nucleus of cells in all
life forms that carries genetic information and is capable of
replicating itself (and synthesizing ribonucleic acid, or RNA). DNA is
[226] Glossary
constructed of two long chains of nucleotides twisted in a double
helix and joined by hydrogen bonds. The sequence of nucleotides—
adenine and thymine or cytosine and guanine—shapes an individual’s
hereditary characteristics.
electrolytes. Any of various minerals (such as sodium, potassium, or
chloride) that carry an electric charge (ions) in blood, sweat, or other
body fluids. Electrolytes are required by cells to regulate the flow of
water molecules through the cell membranes.
enzyme replacement therapy. A way to treat a genetic abnormality by
replacing the enzyme that the gene cannot produce. Genes are
basically blueprints for proteins, and proteins are essentially enzymes.
Thus, when a gene is defective, it fails to code for the protein (or
enzyme) for which it is designed. The effect is that the enzyme will be
defective or missing altogether. Among the most successful enzyme
replacement therapies currently in use are those for cystic fibrosis
(oral pancreatic extracts) and Gaucher’s disease.
epithelial cells. Cells that cover the surface of the body and line its
cavities.
Fanconi’s anemia. A rare hereditary anemia characterized by retarded
growth (hypoplasia) of the bone marrow and abnormally low levels of
white blood cells, platelets, and erythrocytes in the blood.
gangliosidoses. A group of diseases caused by the deficiency of an
enzyme necessary for the breakdown of lipids or fatty molecules
(gangliosides). These deficiencies can produce devastating
neurological symptoms. Tay-Sachs disease (a beta-hexosaminidase
deficiency) is categorized as a GM2 gangliosidosis.
Gaucher disease or Gaucher’s disease. A disease that has been described
as the most common lipid storage disorder. It results from the
deficiency of an enzyme (glucocerabrocidase) that normally helps the
body break down specific fatty substances. The glucocerabrocidase
deficiency allows these fatty substances to accumulate in the so-called
Gaucher cells found in the bone marrow, spleen, liver, and other parts
of the body. Once there, those fatty substances become toxic and can
cause anemia, easy bruising and bleeding (low platelet count), bone
pain, and bone fractures. The course of the disease is quite variable,
ranging from no outward symptoms to severe disability and death.
There are three types of Gaucher’s disease. Type I is often said to be
the most common genetic disorder found among Ashkenazic Jews.
Glossary [227]
Type I is also the mildest form of Gaucher’s. It can emerge at any time
from infancy to adulthood, and it does not affect the brain or have
significant neurological symptoms. Type I is manageable using
enzyme (glucocerabrocidase) replacement therapy. In contrast to
Type I, the other two forms of Gaucher’s involve severe neurological
effects and strike in infancy (Type II) or childhood (Type III); in
addition, their incidence is roughly the same across ethnicities.
Enzyme replacement therapy has shown disappointing results in
cases of Gaucher’s with neurological involvement. The cause of the
enzyme deficiency in all forms of Gaucher’s disease is genetic, the
result of a mutation received from both parents. It is an autosomal
recessive disorder. See also Ashkenazic Jews, autosomal recessive
inheritance, Jewish genetic disorders, and lipid storage disorders.
gene pool. The collection of genes of all the individuals in an
interbreeding population.
genome. A single, complete set of chromosomes in an organism.
gene therapy. Experimental technology aimed at treating disease by
attempting to replace a defective gene in the body with a healthy one.
This can be done in many ways—for example, by removing bone
marrow cells, then using genetic engineering techniques to change
defective sequences in the DNA and reimplanting the altered cells.
Other attempts at gene therapy have employed modified viruses
(adenoviruses, retroviruses, etc.) as a delivery mechanism to attempt
to carry healthy genes to a diseased part of the body.
gene transfer. A more technical term for gene therapy denoting the transfer
of healthy genes to a diseased part of the body in the hope that the
new genes will produce the protein normally required by the body,
and thereby correct the problem.
genetic disease. A disease that is linked to genetic material either
inherited from parents or present because of individual mutation.
Thus, the term genetic disease overlaps with, but is not synonymous
with, hereditary disease.
genetic screening and testing. Methods for determining whether a
person has a specific gene, usually done to understand the likelihood
that the person will develop a disorder or pass the disease to
offspring. Genetic screening and testing takes many forms, including
(1) carrier screening to see if an individual has a recessive gene
mutation that he or she might pass to progeny; (2) diagnostic testing
[228] Glossary
to see if an individual has a specific genetic disorder; (3) newborn
screening to test an infant for congenital disorders; (4) predictive
testing to determine the likelihood that an individual has a gene that
might one day develop into disease; (5) prenatal testing to assess the
health status of a fetus; and so on.
glycolipid. A fatty molecule (lipid) that contains one or more
carbohydrate groups. Glycolipids are found in the plasma membranes
of all animals and some plant cells. Blood group antigens, for
example, are glycolipids.
graft-versus-host disease (GVHD). A condition in which bone marrow
cells transplanted from a donor launch an immunological attack on
the cells of the patient who received the transplant. GVHD can be
treated with immunosuppressive drugs such as cyclosporin. Chronic
or acute, GVHD can be a devastating, generally fatal, complication of
bone marrow transplantation.
heart-lung transplant (HLT). A procedure, first performed in 1981, that
replaces a recipient’s diseased heart and lungs with organs from a
donor. Recipients rely on long-term immunosuppressive therapy to
slow the body’s rejection of the donor organs.
hemoglobinopathy. A general term for a wide range of inherited blood
disorders such as sickle cell anemia, hemolytic anemia, and
thalassemia. These diseases are caused by abnormalities in the
molecular structure of hemoglobin.
hemophilia. The oldest known hereditary bleeding disorder, in which the
clotting ability of the blood is impaired and excessive bleeding results.
Small wounds and punctures are usually not a problem, but
uncontrolled internal bleeding can result in pain and swelling and
permanent damage, especially to joints and muscles. Hemophilia
results from a deficiency of clotting protein (either factor VIII or
factor IX) and varies in severity depending on the amount of clotting
protein that is missing. Hemophilia is caused by an inherited sexlinked recessive trait with the defective gene located on the
X chromosome. It conforms to a classic X-linked inheritance pattern.
Females are carriers of this trait. Fifty percent of the male offspring of
female carriers have the disease, and 50 percent of their female
offspring are carriers. All female children of a male with hemophilia
are carriers of the trait. With very rare exceptions, only males have the
disease. See X-linked inheritance.
Glossary [229]
hereditary disease. Inherited disease; disease passed from parent to
offspring through genes.
heterozygote. A carrier of an autosomal recessive trait. In the case of
autosomal recessive disorders like cystic fibrosis and sickle cell
disease, the carrier does not have the disease but can potentially
transmit it to his or her progeny. See autosomal recessive inheritance.
Hex-A deficiency or hexosaminidase A deficiency. See
beta-hexosaminidase deficiency and Tay-Sachs disease.
human leukocyte antigen (HLA). A protein on the surface of cells that
communicates to white blood cells whether the cells are ‘‘self ’’ or
‘‘not-self.’’ HLA enables the body’s immune system to attack only
invading organisms. HLA has been used in addition to ABO blood
types to identify compatible donors for transplant procedures.
Huntington’s chorea. A hereditary disease of the central nervous system
that usually manifests at between thirty and fifty years of age,
characterized by involuntary movements and progressive dementia.
hydroxyurea (HU). An orally administered drug that inhibits the
synthesis of DNA. HU is used to treat chronic myeloid leukemia,
sickle cell disease, polycythemia vera, melanomas, and cancers of the
head, neck, ovary, and cervix. It may cause severe dehydration and
kidney damage.
iatrogenic disease. Disease caused by medical treatment. The term
encompasses a wide range of unintended complications of therapy,
such as side effects or medical error.
Jewish amaurotic idiocy. The term used in the early twentieth century to
refer to what later became known as Tay-Sachs disease. See Tay-Sachs
disease.
Jewish genetic diseases. A term often used by medical geneticists and
other interested parties to describe a group of inherited conditions
that have an unusually high incidence among Jews of Eastern
European (Ashkenazic) ancestry. In other words, the diseases are said
to occur at much higher rates in this group relative to non-Jews and
other Jewish groups (e.g., the Sephardim). The incidence rates can be
as much as one hundred times higher for some conditions. There is
no authoritative list of Jewish genetic diseases, but they include
disorders that result from single-gene mutations (Mendelian
disorders) as well as disease-predisposing conditions that result from
a combination of genes. For Ashkenazic Jews, the Mendelian
[230] Glossary
disorders include Tay-Sachs disease, cystic fibrosis, Type I Gaucher’s
disease, Canavan’s disease, Fanconi’s anemia, and at least eight
others. Ashkenazic Jews are also known to have a high incidence of
genes for the predisposing causes of colon cancer and breast cancer
(in the case of BRCA1 and BRCA2). Sephardic Jews have normal rates of
these diseases but a higher incidence of beta-thalassemia and a few
other inherited conditions.
lipid storage disorders. A group of inherited metabolic disorders in
which harmful amounts of fatty materials called lipids accumulate in
the body’s cells and tissues. People with these disorders either do not
produce enough of one of the enzymes needed to metabolize lipids or
they produce enzymes that do not work properly. Over time, this
excessive storage of fats can result in permanent cellular and tissue
damage, particularly in the brain, peripheral nervous system, liver,
spleen, and bone marrow. The lipid storage disorders include
Gaucher’s disease, Niemann-Pick’s disease, Fabry’s disease, and
Tay-Sachs disease.
lysosomal storage disorders. Disorders caused by dysfunctional
lysosomes (minute saclike bodies, present in many types of cells,
containing enzymes necessary for the process of intracellular
digestion). Lysosomal storage disorders may result in cell damage and
wasting, as in muscular dystrophy, or in the toxic buildup of
undigested fatty molecules (lipids), as in the case of Tay-Sachs
disease or Gaucher’s disease. See lipid storage disorders.
mucopolysaccharide. A gel-like substance found in body cells, mucous
secretions, and synovial fluids. Some genetic diseases (such as
Hunter’s disease) are called mucopolysaccharidoses because they are
caused by a deficiency of enzymes for breaking down
mucopolysaccharides. Such disorders lead to the accumulation of
mucous material throughout the body, causing skeletal deformities,
abnormal facial features, mental retardation, and decreased life
expectancy.
mucoviscidosis. An early term for cystic fibrosis, highlighting the excessive
mucus production throughout the body that characterizes this
disease.
narrow-spectrum antibiotic. See antibiotic.
ornithine transcarbamoylase (OTC) deficiency. A treatable metabolic
disease that impairs the liver’s ability to rid the body of ammonia.
Glossary [231]
Like hemophilia, OTC deficiency is an X-linked disorder, meaning
that, typically, women are carriers of the disorder while males are
sufferers. OTC deficiency is the most common urea-cycle disorder.
All urea-cycle disorders impair the liver’s ability to remove ammonia
from the body. Normally OTC is one of five enzymes that allow the
liver to break down ammonia. The odds of OTC deficiency are
calculated at 1 in every 40,000 births. It typically manifests in
newborns, who within seventy-two hours can slip into coma as
ammonia poisons their bloodstream, often leading to brain damage
or death.
Orphan Drug Act of 1983. A federal law passed in the United States
providing financial incentives to companies to develop drugs for rare
diseases, in an effort to encourage research that would not ordinarily
be profitable. The law provides a seven-year exclusive right to market
to any company that develops the first drug of any type for rare
diseases.
pancreatic deficiency. Inadequate production by the pancreas of insulin
or digestive enzymes required by the body for cells to use energy from
food.
pharmacogenomics. An emerging branch of pharmacology that explores
how genetic factors influence the way organisms respond to drugs,
and that seeks to tailor drugs to individuals based on their particular
genome (or genetic profile).
physiotherapy. Physical therapy; treatment aiming to restore or maintain
function and mobility, to relieve pain, or to mitigate permanent
physical disabilities in patients suffering from disease or injury.
Physiotherapy is employed in the treatment of cystic fibrosis,
accidental injury, arthritis, low back pain, broken bones, heart
disease, and some neurological disorders.
pneumococcal septicemia. Acute pneumonia affecting one or more lobes
of the lungs caused by the bacterium Streptococcus pneumoniae.
polycythemia vera (PV). A blood disorder, also called erythremia, that
involves the overproduction of red blood cells due to a disorder of the
bone marrow.
postural drainage. A form of therapy often used in cystic fibrosis that
consists of positioning a patient with the throat inclined downward
and using percussion with the hands (striking the chest and back),
taking advantage of gravity to help clear severe lung congestion.
[232] Glossary
prenatal testing. Testing a fetus in utero for the presence of disease prior
to birth. See amniocentesis testing and chorionic villi sampling.
Pseudomonas aeruginosa. A species of bacteria that usually lives in soil,
marshes, and coastal marine environments that may infect humans. It
is rarely found in healthy individuals but tends to infect people with
burns, those who have weakened immune systems, or those who are
on respirators. It often spreads in hospitals. In patients with cystic
fibrosis, the constant use of antibiotics to prevent lung infections
related to excessive mucus production may allow pseudomonas to
colonize the lungs, contributing to chronic pulmonary problems and
early death. Pseudomonas infections may cause urinary tract
infections, infections of the bloodstream, and pneumonia.
reductionism. The belief that all complex phenomena can be explained by
breaking them down into component parts and isolating single
causes.
sickle cell disease (SCD). An autosomal recessive disease, also known as
sickle cell anemia, characterized by abnormal crescent- or sickle-shaped
red blood cells. The sickled cells impair the oxygen-carrying capacity
of the hemoglobin, depriving tissues of oxygen and blood. Because of
their shape, the cells may also clog small blood vessels, causing
severe pain and tissue damage. SCD may be experienced as acute pain
in the joints, legs, or abdomen and may damage organs such as the
liver, kidney, or brain. Lung infections are common.
selective abortion. The choice to terminate a pregnancy because the fetus
is likely to be born with a serious birth defect or impairment. In this
sense, selective abortion might be considered to be therapeutic (a
form of treatment). However, the term has also been used to describe
abortions in cases where a certain trait (e.g., the sex of the fetus) is
simply not preferred by the parent. Such uses of selective abortion are
generally not considered to be therapeutic. Contrast therapeutic
abortion.
Sephardic Jews or Sephardim. Jewish people of Iberian (Spanish or
Portuguese) ancestry. The Sephardim are one of the major ethnic
divisions among Jews, and their ranks are often said to include Jews
who migrated from the Iberian Peninsula to North Africa. See also
Ashkenazic Jews.
strep (Streptococcus) infection/septicemia. One of several types of
streptococcal (bacterial) infections in humans, which can result in
Glossary [233]
pneumonia, skin infections, rheumatic fever, tonsillitis, scarlet fever,
meningitis, and infected wounds. Pneumococcal septicemia
(poisoning of the blood stream with virulent microorganisms) can be
one of the severe complications of Tay-Sachs disease, sickle cell
disease, or cystic fibrosis.
Tay-Sachs disease (TSD). A fatal autosomal recessive disorder of the
central nervous system that results from the deficiency of an enzyme
called beta-hexosaminidase A (Hex-A), which normally helps the body
break down specific fatty substances (GM2 gangliosides). The Hex-A
deficiency results in the gradual destruction of the nervous system
because the gangliosides become toxic as they accumulate in the brain
and nervous tissue. There is no treatment for Tay-Sachs. Infants with
Tay-Sachs develop normally for the first few months, then experience
gradual and progressive mental deterioration followed by blindness,
seizures, paralysis, and death. There is another, extremely rare form
of Tay-Sachs that afflicts adults. People with late-onset Tay-Sachs
have a similar mutation but suffer a more chronic form of the malady
because they are able to produce some amount of the Hex-A enzyme.
Both forms of Tay-Sachs disease have been categorized as GM2
gangliosidoses. See also autosomal recessive inheritance,
gangliosidoses, and lipid storage disorders.
thalassemia. An inherited form of anemia, particularly prevalent in the
Mediterranean, that involves impaired production of the red blood
pigment hemoglobin. One form, beta-thalassemia, has an unusually
high incidence among Sephardic Jews. See also hemoglobinopathy.
therapeutic abortion. The termination of a pregnancy out of concern for
the health of the mother or fetus. A therapeutic abortion is usually
justified on the following grounds: (1) to preserve the life of the
mother; (2) to terminate a nonviable pregnancy; (3) to preserve the
life of one or more fetuses in the case of a multifetal pregnancy; or
(4) to prevent the birth of a child with defects associated with
significant morbidity or mortality. Contrast selective abortion.
wide-spectrum antibiotic. See antibiotic.
urea. A water-soluble compound that is an end product of protein
decomposition and is the main solid constituent of urine in
mammals.
X-linked inheritance. Pattern of hereditary transmission in which the
expression of a trait is dependent on the sex characteristics of the
[234] Glossary
offspring. Humans possess twenty-three pairs of chromosomes:
twenty-two autosomes and one pair of sex chromosomes. Males have
X and Y sex chromosomes, receiving a Y chromosome from their
father (which makes them male) and an X chromosome from their
mother. Females have two X chromosomes, receiving one from each
parent. A gene that is X-linked is physically located on the
X chromosome. When someone has inherited a defective X-linked
gene, that gene will manifest differently depending on which parent
contributed that gene: sometimes it will produce disease, sometimes
not. When a male inherits a defective gene, he will develop the disease
because males have only one copy of the X chromosome; they thus
have no backup copy to make the protein product that that gene
would normally make for the body. Women who have one mutated
copy of the gene are typically unaffected carriers because their one
functional copy can produce all the protein product required by the
body. For an example of an X-linked recessive inheritance disorder,
see hemophilia. Contrast autosomal dominant inheritance,
autosomal inheritance, and autosomal recessive inheritance.
Glossary [235]
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index
abortion, 13, 17–18, 24, 26, 32,
33, 37–42, 53–54, 65, 88, 223,
233, 234
adenovirus, 65, 97–98, 99–102,
104–8, 125, 158, 168, 223
Alex: The Life of a Child, 36, 67–68,
73
amaurotic familial idiocy, 22. See
also Tay-Sachs disease
African-American(s), 1, 2, 6, 9–
10, 34, 79, 112, 114, 120–21,
125, 130, 134, 139, 141, 164,
171–72; and BiDil (‘‘first ethnic
drug’’ for heart disease), 171–
73; biology and inheritance,
7, 9, 10, 34, 117; children and
families, 4, 34, 57, 120, 124,
137–38, 155; communities, 34,
57, 78, 120, 140, 150, 159; and
cystic fibrosis, 78–79, 112; and
genetic screening and counseling, 34, 57, 120–21, 131; and
health care system, 116–21, 125,
128, 130–31, 132, 134, 136–39,
142, 146, 153–56, 164; history
and identity, 6–8, 9, 10, 67,
114, 119–21, 125, 138–40, 148,
159, 162, 165, 172; and lottery,
147–57, 164; pain and suffering, 124–25, 128, 139, 148; and
racial politics, 34, 75–77, 79,
117, 119, 125, 128, 130–31, 138–
41, 148, 164–65; sickle cell
disease as black concern, 4, 9,
77, 79, 114, 116–17, 119, 125,
130, 132; socioeconomic status,
121, 138–40, 148, 153–56, 159
AIDS (Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome), 12–13, 104,
109, 166, 210
Anderson, Dorothy, 68
Anderson, W. French, 65, 94,
161
Anglo-Americans. See white,
European, Euro-, and AngloAmericans
antibiotics, 5, 80–84, 93, 124,
161, 223; antibiotic-resistant
organisms, 81–84, 136–37, 151;
penicillin, 80, 82, 84, 124, 132,
136–38, 146, 166, 167
Argentina, 62
autosomal dominant inheritance,
223–24
autosomal inheritance, 224
autosomal recessive inheritance,
33, 224
Babies Hospital, New York City,
68, 70
Barbero, Guilio, 77–78, 112, 170
Beall, Robert, 91
beta-hexosaminidase deficiency,
224
Beutler, Ernest, 135, 151
BiDil, 171–73
biotechnology industry, 32, 37,
49, 50–55, 57, 65, 98, 101–3,
biotechnology industry (continued)
108–9, 120, 131, 169, 170. See
also pharmaceutical industry
birth control, 43
blood-brain barrier, 31, 64, 225
bone marrow transplantation
(BMT). See sickle cell disease,
treatment options
Boston, 52, 70, 140, 155, 158
Boucher, Richard, 94, 100
Brady, Roscoe, 30, 53
breakthrough medicine, 2, 5, 15,
51, 55, 64, 83, 90, 103, 110, 116,
118–19, 121–22, 126–27, 132,
142, 145, 147, 150, 161, 165,
167–68, 170, 173; as ideology,
2, 51, 83, 118, 161, 168, 173
Bristol-Myers Squibb Company,
145–46
Brodkin, Karen, 9
Bush, George H. W., 109, 210
California, 43
cancer, 13, 46, 52, 71, 75, 102,
163, 166, 170; breast cancer,
2, 13, 46–47, 121, 225; breast
cancer genes (BRCA-1 and
BRCA-2), 2, 46–47, 225; prostate cancer, 13; war on cancer,
75. See also leukemia
capitalism, 166; marketplace, 47,
54, 103, 104, 113, 153–54, 168;
start-up biotechnology companies, 96, 98–101, 108; venture
capital, 2, 95, 100, 101–3, 108,
150. See also biotechnology
industry; entrepreneurs; phar[238] Index
maceutical industry; scientists,
as researcher/entrepreneurs
carrier(s), 19, 25–27, 35, 37–38,
40, 42, 49, 57, 78–79, 92, 116–
17, 121, 130–31, 133, 135, 226,
230. See also cystic fibrosis,
carriers; sickle cell disease,
carriers (sickle cell trait) and
testing; Tay-Sachs disease,
carriers
Caucasian people. See white,
European, Euro-, and AngloAmericans
cerebral sphingolipidoses, 16, 226
Chaplin, Hugh, 116, 118, 159
Charache, Samuel, 144–45, 156
Chicago, 18, 154
Children’s Medical Center,
Boston, 70
Chile, 62
chorionic villi sampling (CVS), 28,
93, 134, 226
clinical research trials, 82–84,
95–96, 98–99, 105, 107–8, 126,
130, 144–46, 158
Clinton, William Jefferson, 109,
154
Collins, Francis, 3, 20, 29, 44–45,
61, 63, 94, 161, 165
Cooley’s anemia, 151, 226
Crick, Francis, 123
Crystal, Ronald, 12, 94, 97–99,
105, 108, 210–11
cystic fibrosis (CF), 1, 3–10, 12–
13, 20–21, 24, 29, 32–33, 36,
44–45, 50, 55, 58, 59, 60–124,
131, 134, 139, 141, 151, 157–
59, 161–62, 164–67, 169–71,
173, 224, 226; and biotechnology entrepreneurs, 65, 83,
85, 89–91, 95–105, 150, 157;
carriers, 78–79, 92; causes and
mechanisms, 74–75, 92, 94;
diagnostic advances, 69, 72,
92–93; —electrolyte sweat test,
69; —screening, 82; discovery,
68–69, 70, 93, 198–99; doctorpatient relations, 67, 68–74,
83, 118; and Dor Yeshorim, 20–
21, 29, 44–45; and families,
68–74, 76, 80, 83, 87, 97–98,
100–101, 110–11, 118, 120, 200;
gene, 61–63, 68, 91–93, 95,
111–12, 131, 170, 196 (see also
delta F 508 gene); increasing
life expectancy, 46, 61, 63, 70–
71, 73, 79–80, 82, 85–87, 90,
92, 98, 111; inheritance, 3, 33,
74, 92, 224; issues of identity:
—African-Americans, 78–79,
112; —Jewish populations, 44,
60; —and panethnicity, 74–80,
114, 170, 201; —white identity, 7, 60, 61–62, 67, 74, 76,
78–79, 91, 92, 95–96, 111–14,
117, 121, 150, 158–59, 169–
70, 195, 201; and legislation,
75–79; nature of malady: —as
generalized disorder, 69, 71,
73, 110–11; —infections, 80–
85, 89, 137, 150; —as lung or
pulmonary disorder, 74–80, 85,
91, 101–2, 139; —as metabolic
disorder, 75–78; —morbidity
and mortality, 63, 70, 86, 88,
92–93; —as mucus disorder
(mucoviscidosis), 69, 199, 231;
—as pancreatic disorder, 68;
—as Pseudomonas bacteria, 81–
84, 136–37, 233; patient(s), 4,
5, 63, 68–74, 76, 79–80, 82,
85–87, 90–91, 100–101, 110–11,
120, 124, 139, 158, 200, 204;
—experiences and symptoms,
63, 66, 67–68, 70, 84, 86, 88,
92; poster child, 36, 78; prevention, 63, 93, 162; research
subjects, 97–104; scientific
and medical research, 12, 68–
69, 70, 72, 74–79, 80, 83–85,
90–91, 94, 100–102, 105, 108,
110–11, 118, 120, 121, 123, 139,
147; and sickle cell disease, 67,
112, 165; and socioeconomic
status, 72, 76–77, 111; symbolic
significance, 1, 6, 10, 12–13,
114; treatment options, 63, 67–
68, 70, 72–73, 80, 82, 85–91,
93, 95, 97–98, 103, 110, 111,
118, 199, 204–5: —antibiotics,
67–69, 80–85, 90, 97, 103;
—comprehensive care, 71–74,
89–90, 103, 111, 118; —gene
therapy, 12, 32, 64–67, 80, 91,
94–103, 108–12, 119–20, 124,
151, 157, 158, 161, 163, 165;
—lung/heart-lung transplantation, 67, 80, 85–91, 93, 95, 97,
103, 111, 204–5, 229; —risks
and side-effects, 66, 80–85,
88–91, 98–102, 103–10, 115, 151
Index [239]
Cystic Fibrosis Foundation, 36,
64, 71–72, 77–78, 91
deafness, 47–48
Deford, Alex, 68–69, 112
Deford, Frank, 36, 67–68, 73, 81,
112, 165
delta F 508 gene (DF508), 62–63,
111–12, 170, 196; and white
identity, 62–63
Denmark, 62
diabetes, 63, 66, 87, 88, 92, 166,
167
Diamond, Jared, 25, 194
di Sant’ Agnese, Paul, 68–71, 75
disease: symbolic significance,
1, 6, 10, 12–13, 15, 56, 58, 117,
121, 125. See also AIDS; betahexosaminidase deficiency;
cancer; Cooley’s anemia; cystic
fibrosis; diabetes; end-stage
renal disease; Fabry’s disease;
Fanconi’s anemia; Gaucher
disease; genetic diseases; graftversus-host disease; heart
disease; hemophilia; hexa deficiency; Huntington’s
chorea; leukemia; lipid storage
disorder; lysosomal storage
disorder; malaria; muscular
dystrophy; Orphan Disease Act
of 1983; OTC deficiency; sickle
cell disease; Tay-Sachs disease;
thalassemia; tuberculosis
DNA, 97, 123, 142–43, 226–27
DNase, 98
Doershuk, Carl, 70
Dor Yeshorim, 3, 18–21, 28–31,
[240] Index
33, 40, 41–50, 52–59, 61, 63,
65, 120, 162, 163, 165, 192, 194;
as genetic matchmaking, 41,
43–45, 50, 55–58, 118, 162, 189;
origins, 18–19, 29, 189
drugs, 11, 31–32, 50, 52–55, 81,
83–87, 96, 98, 116, 134, 136–38,
139–40, 142–43, 147, 164–65,
171–72; cost, 53–55, 136–38,
146. See also antibiotics; BiDil;
clinical research trials; cystic
fibrosis, treatment options;
DNase; enzyme replacement
therapy; insulin; pharmacogenomics; sickle cell disease,
treatment options; Tay-Sachs
disease, treatment options
Ekstein, Rabbi Josef, 18, 20, 29,
41–43, 46, 49, 51, 53–55, 189,
194. See also Dor Yeshorim
electrolytes, 227
end-stage renal disease, 167
entrepreneurs, 2, 5, 7, 65, 85, 89–
91, 95–96, 100–102, 112, 118,
150, 157, 161, 162, 166, 169. See
also capitalism
enzyme replacement therapy, 26–
32, 40, 53, 57, 59, 64, 169,
227. See also Gaucher’s disease,
treatment options; Tay-Sachs
disease, treatment options
epithelial cells, 227
ethical controversies. See genetic
medicine, ethical controversies
ethicist(s), 10, 29, 44–45, 59,
154–55, 208–9
ethnicity and ethnic communi-
ties, 1, 3, 6, 7–8, 10, 15, 19, 21,
23, 35, 40, 50, 51, 57, 58–59,
63, 79, 118, 162, 164, 165, 169,
170, 172–73; minority groups,
7–8, 34, 50–51, 148, 162–63.
See also African-American(s);
history and identity; French
Canadians; Greek-Americans;
Italian-Americans; Jewish
people, history and identity;
Louisiana, Cajuns and TaySachs disease; Pennsylvania
Dutch; white, European, Euro-,
and Anglo-Americans, history
and identity
eugenics, 7–8
Fabry’s disease, 30, 231
Fanconi, Guido, 68
Fanconi’s anemia, 158, 227
Farber, Sidney, 69, 199
Finland, 62
Fletcher, John, 59
Florida, 43
Food and Drug Administration
(FDA), 53, 90, 98, 105, 107–9,
146, 170–71, 208–10
France, 112, 113
Franco-American groups, 19.
See also Louisiana, Cajuns and
Tay-Sachs disease
Fred Hutchison Cancer Research
Center, 149
French Canadians, 19, 27, 41, 169
Friedman, Bonnie, 26
gangliosidoses, 16, 22, 27, 227
Gans, Herbert, 6–7
Gaucher’s disease, 20–21, 26,
28–32, 35, 44–45, 49–55, 169,
192–94, 227, 231; and Dor Yeshorim, 20–21, 44–45, 49, 53–
55; drug costs, 53–55; gene, 51;
and Jewish identity, 28, 30, 44,
51–52, 54; as lipid/lysosomal
storage disease, 26, 28, 30, 51,
231; pharmaceutical research,
51–55; screening, 51–55; symptoms, 51–52; treatment options, enzyme replacement
therapy, 28, 30–32, 52, 53;
type I, 28, 30, 54–55, 192–93
gay communities, 13, 210
Gelsinger, Jessie, 94, 103–10, 163,
208–10
Gelsinger, Paul, 94, 105–7
gene(s), 2, 24, 34, 46–47, 51, 61–
63, 68, 91–93, 95, 111–12, 131,
133–34, 170
Genentech, Inc., 98, 169
gene pool, 228
gene therapy, 5, 12, 32, 50, 59–60,
61–115, 119–21, 124, 141, 143,
150, 157–59, 161, 165, 169–71,
197, 208–11, 222, 228; as ideology, 50, 63, 65–66, 96, 109–10,
114–15, 118, 124, 147, 165–66
(see also genetic medicine, hype
surrounding); regulation of,
103–10; safety and side effects,
94, 99–100, 104–10; venture
capital and, 2, 95–96, 100–103,
150
genetic disease(s), 2–3, 11–12,
20, 50, 57, 118, 120, 165, 228;
carriers of (see carrier[s]); and
Index [241]
genetic disease(s) (continued)
counseling, 16, 33–34, 40–41,
57, 120–21, 131; and discrimination, 7, 37–38, 49; and families,
5, 13–15, 33–36, 41, 56–57,
66, 67–74, 76, 80, 87, 97, 100–
101, 108, 110–11, 118–20, 147,
149, 154–55, 157, 159, 181; and
group identity, 4, 6, 8, 10–13,
17, 21, 34, 55, 57–59, 63, 114,
159, 163, 170, 174; homosexuality and ‘‘gay gene,’’ 13, 47,
166; and inheritance, 3, 33, 27,
47, 49–51, 74, 125, 166, 223–
24, 230, 234; laws regarding
(see legislation); premarital
testing, 40, 42; prenatal testing, 33, 36, 40, 41–50, 232;
prevention of, 1, 2, 3, 12, 15–
60, 63, 93, 134, 161–62, 168;
and religious values, 6, 15–60
passim; risk of, 2, 30, 39–40,
46, 131; screening and testing,
16, 28, 31, 33–34, 37, 41–50,
52–53, 55, 56, 58–59, 120, 131,
228–29; —amniocentesis, 28,
33, 37, 93, 134, 223; and selfdetermination, 6, 20–21, 50;
and stigma, 7, 19, 34, 37–38,
42, 45, 48–49; treatment, 1, 45,
50–55, 59 (see also under specific
diseases, treatment options); use
of information, 21, 39, 42–45,
46, 48–49, 55–57. See also Dor
Yeshorim
genetic matchmaking. See Dor
Yeshorim
[242] Index
genetic medicine, 1–5, 7–8, 10,
12–13, 50, 58–60, 61–115, 119,
141, 159–60, 161–63, 165–66,
168–71, 222, 228; boosters,
2, 103, 110, 121, 131, 157; as
business, 2, 4, 47–48, 50–55,
56, 65, 79, 95, 100–101, 103–
8, 110, 114, 167, 168 (see also
capitalism); entrepreneurs in
(see entrepreneurs); ethical controversies, 2, 5, 13, 20, 29–30,
36–39, 40, 41–50, 53–54, 59,
67, 80, 101, 103, 106–7, 118–19,
126–29, 135–36, 147–57, 159,
165, 166, 168; hype surrounding, 2–3, 4, 5, 65, 67, 94–95,
99–104, 106, 108, 109–10, 142–
46, 150, 157, 161, 163, 168–69,
170–71; as ideology, 50, 63, 65–
66, 109–10, 114–15, 118, 124,
147, 165–66; and legislation, 5,
75–79, 113 (see also legislation);
and media (see media). See also
gene therapy; genetic disease
genetic(s) revolution, 1–3, 5, 10,
12, 63, 110, 119, 121, 142, 162,
168
genome, 228
Genvec, Inc., 98, 102, 169
Genzyme, Inc., 32, 52–53, 101–2
Goldberg, James, 31
Goodman, Len, 38–39
Goodman, Madeleine, 38–39
graft-versus-host disease (GVHD),
149, 153, 229
Greece, 5, 117
Greek-Americans, 79
health insurance, 49, 75, 77, 79,
87, 89, 138, 146, 156, 194
health services and procedures.
See abortion; clinical research
trials; cystic fibrosis; Dor Yeshorim; genetic disease; health
insurance; sickle cell disease;
Tay-Sachs disease
heart disease, 20, 30, 52, 102, 163,
171–77
hemoglobinopathy, 129, 132, 229
hemophilia, 95, 121, 158, 166, 194,
229, 235
hereditary transmission, 3, 223–
24, 234
Herrick, James, 122
heterozygote(s), 25, 49, 116, 212,
230. See also carrier(s); cystic
fibrosis, carriers; sickle cell
disease, carriers and testing;
Tay-Sachs disease, carriers
Hex-a deficiency, 24–26, 57, 230
human genome, 2, 91
Human Genome Project, 3, 20,
29, 44–45, 61, 90, 131
human leukocyte antigen (HLA)
match, 148, 156, 230
Huntington’s chorea, 230
innovation, 1, 2, 5, 7, 10, 13, 15,
52–53, 58–59, 73, 79–80, 90–
91, 96, 110–11, 114–15, 118–19,
132, 149–50, 160–62, 164–69,
171, 173. See also biotechnology
industry; capitalism; entrepreneurs; pharmaceutical
industry
insulin, 166–67. See also diabetes
insurance. See health insurance
Israel, 4, 5, 19, 38, 54, 194
Italian-Americans, 79, 114
Italy, 5, 117
Jacobsen, Matthew Frye, 36
Jeselsohn, Sura, 29–30, 45
Jewish amaurotic idiocy, 7, 15–16,
230. See also Tay-Sachs disease
Jewish people, 1–4, 7–10, 13–60,
65, 118, 162–63, 169, 182, 190–
91, 223; and abortion, 18, 38,
40–42; and anti-Semitism, 7,
38, 49; Ashkenazim, 4, 9, 15,
17, 23–25, 27–28, 30, 38, 46–
48, 54, 169, 223; Conservative,
9, 42; and contraception, 43;
and cystic fibrosis, 3, 44, 60;
diversity among, 8–9, 17, 22;
European origins, 15, 17, 23–
25; families, 16, 20, 35, 42, 43,
59; and Gaucher’s disease, 28,
30, 44, 51–52, 54; history and
identity, 6–8, 10, 15, 17, 23–
24, 25, 30, 36–37, 46, 51–52,
54–55, 159, 165; and ‘‘Jewish
genes,’’ 14, 44, 49; and Jewish
genetic diseases, 20, 27, 39,
46, 48–49, 51–52, 54, 58, 60,
114, 193, 230–31; and marriage
and intermarriage, 24, 35, 36,
40, 42, 44–45; Mizrahim, 23;
Orthodox, 9, 19, 40, 42–44,
47; parents or couple, 15, 57;
rabbis and Tay-Sachs disease,
17–20, 34, 39, 41–50, 51, 55,
Index [243]
Jewish people (continued)
189, 194; as racial group, 8–9,
15, 17, 23, 36, 58; Reform, 9,
42; and religious law, 38, 41,
43; self-determination, 16,
20–21, 33–41, 58, 65, 118; selfpreservation and survival, 4,
7, 17, 33–41, 54, 58, 65, 162;
Sephardim, 9, 23–24, 27, 232;
suffering of, 4, 15, 55; and TaySachs disease prevention, 3,
14–60, 191; Ultra-Orthodox,
3, 18, 42–44, 56, 58, 118, 162–
63, 190; as ‘‘white,’’ 9, 17, 36;
women, 46–47
justice, 10, 13, 76, 119, 135, 141,
173–74; racial, 7, 79, 141; social, 2, 6, 12, 121, 132, 134, 141
Kaback, Michael, 20, 29, 52–53,
56, 163, 165
kidney dialysis, 79
kidney failure, 71, 88, 167, 194
Kingsbrook Jewish Medical Center, New York, 18, 41
lay media: Atlanta Journal and Constitution, 113; Black Enterprise,
136; Business Week, 2, 95, 98;
Discover Magazine, 25, 64, 99;
Newsweek, 97, 142, 156; New York
Times, 47, 95, 97, 104, 109, 113;
People Magazine, 89; St. Louis
Post-Dispatch, 148; Seattle Times,
122; Time, 88, 126; Wall Street
Journal, 146; Washington Post, 67,
112–13
legislation, 5–6, 11, 32–33, 37,
[244] Index
52–53, 75–79, 82, 125, 187,
201. See also Medicaid; Medicare; National Heart, Lung,
Blood Vessel, and Blood Bill
of 1972; National Sickle Cell
Anemia Control Act of 1972;
National Sickle Cell Anemia,
Cooley’s Anemia, Tay-Sachs,
and Genetic Disease Act of
1976; Orphan Disease Act of
1983
leukemia, 142, 145–47, 152
lipid storage disorder(s), 16, 22–
23, 25–26, 28, 32, 50, 57, 231
Los Angeles Children’s Hospital,
70
Louisiana, 19; Cajuns and TaySachs disease, 19, 27, 41, 169
lysosomal storage disorder(s), 16,
22, 32, 51, 231
malaria, 117, 132, 169
malpractice, 36, 188
marriage, 8, 19, 24, 35–36, 40. See
also Dor Yeshorim
Marsten, Robert, 76–77
mastectomy, 2
McClelland, Lenabell, 116
media, 2, 10, 48–49, 60, 64–66,
97, 108, 116, 126–27, 142, 148,
165–66, 168–69, 170; and gene
therapy, 64, 66, 95, 97, 170;
headlines, 47–49, 168–69, 170,
174; journalists, 88–89, 104,
116, 121, 171; lay media (see lay
media); medical and scientific journals (see medical and
scientific journals)
Medicaid, 138
medical and scientific journals:
Hematology Oncology Clinics of
North America, 146; Journal of
the American Medical Association
(JAMA), 128; Medical World
News, 126; New England Journal
of Medicine, 59, 142, 154; Science
magazine, 99–100
Medicare, 167
Michigan, 43
mucopolysaccharide, 231
mucoviscidosis, 69, 231. See cystic
fibrosis
muscular dystrophy, 77
Nagel, Ronald, 135, 151–53
Nalbandian, Robert, 126–27, 129,
131
Nathan, David, 158
National Heart, Lung, and Blood
Institute, 97–98
National Heart, Lung, Blood
Vessel, and Blood Bill of 1972,
77, 82
National Institute of Arthritis and
Metabolic Diseases, 76
National Institutes of Health
(NIH), 53, 75, 78, 108, 144
National Sickle Cell Anemia,
Cooley’s Anemia, Tay-Sachs,
and Genetic Diseases Act of
1976, 37, 82
National Sickle Cell Anemia
Control Act of 1972, 78, 125
National Socialist White People’s
Party, 112
Nazism, 7, 38, 49
Nelson, John, 84
Netherlands, the, 62
New Hampshire, 19
New York City, 18, 25, 41, 44, 45,
48, 114
Nitromed, Inc., 172
Nixon, Richard, 75, 125, 128, 130
O’Brien, John, 24
Okada, Shintaro, 24
organ donors, 148, 156, 230
ornithine transcarbamolyase
(OTC) deficiency, 94, 104–5,
231–32
Orphan Disease Act of 1983, 32,
52–53
pain, 117, 121, 129, 132–33, 138–
41, 145, 150–51, 158–59, 164;
and sickle cell disease, 117,
121, 129, 132–33, 138–41, 145,
150–51, 158, 164
patients, 10–11, 16, 46, 54, 56, 65–
66, 109, 111, 116, 142, 167, 171;
activism and advocacy, 13, 109,
153; with cystic fibrosis, 4, 5,
63, 66, 68–74, 76, 79–80, 82,
84–88, 90–92, 97–98, 100–101,
110–11, 120, 124, 139, 158, 200,
204; with sickle cell disease,
4–5, 12, 116, 119–21, 124, 138–
41, 146–47, 149, 154–57, 164;
with Tay-Sachs disease, 4, 14–
15, 16, 18, 21–24, 26–28, 34–36,
41, 111, 118
Paul, Diane, 8
Pauling, Linus, 3, 38, 123–24,
131–32, 135
Index [245]
penicillin. See cystic fibrosis,
treatment options; sickle cell
disease, treatment options
Pennsylvania Dutch, 19
pharmaceutical industry, 11, 49,
51–55, 67, 85, 102–3, 109, 111,
113, 116, 145–46, 172, 211. See
also biotechnology industry;
drugs
pharmacogenomics, 50, 171–73,
179, 232
physicians (doctors), 2, 4–5, 11,
16, 33, 36–37, 40, 46, 56, 59,
66, 82, 95–97, 135, 146, 155,
159, 161, 172. See also scientists;
specialists
physiotherapy, 82, 93
Platt, Orah, 140
polio vaccine, 66–67, 104
polycythemia vera, 143–44, 232
population control, 34, 120–21
Portugal, 62
Protestantism, 34, 163
race, 1, 3, 6–10, 15, 17, 58–59,
61, 95–96, 113–14, 117, 119,
130, 132, 135, 159–60, 162, 164,
169–70, 172–73, 179, 212
Ramsey, Bonnie, 97
Reagan, Ronald, 52, 109, 154, 210
Recombinant DNA Advisory
Committee (RAC), 109, 208–11
reductionism, 123–30, 233
Reid, Clarice, 136
risk and risk-taking, 2, 6, 12, 30,
33, 37, 39–40, 57–59, 65–66,
80, 87, 89–91, 97, 103–5, 107,
110, 114–15, 118–20, 126, 135–
[246] Index
36, 148, 150–56, 163–65, 170,
173–74. See also under cystic
fibrosis; sickle cell disease
Rogers, Griffin, 144
Sachs, Bernard, 21
Schering-Plough Company, 211
scientists, 7–8, 16, 23–25, 33,
46, 52, 56–57, 63–64, 76, 85,
95–96, 101–3, 105–7, 110, 116–
17, 122, 135, 154–56, 167, 169,
212; and profit-seeking, 32,
47, 56, 90, 107, 110, 169 (see
also capitalism); as researcher/
entrepreneurs, 85, 95, 96, 101–
10, 169. See also specialists and
speciality groups
sickle cell disease (SCD), 1, 3–7,
9–10, 12–13, 17, 24, 32–36,
38, 56–57, 59, 67, 75–78, 80,
95, 114–62, 164–67, 169–71,
173, 212–13, 215, 219, 224,
230, 233–34; carriers (sickle
cell trait) and testing, 38, 57,
78, 117, 121, 130–31, 133, 135;
causes and mechanisms, 123–
33; children and families, 5, 34,
57, 119–20, 138, 147, 149, 154–
55, 157; diagnostic advances,
122, 124, 134; discovery, 122–
23, 130; gene (hemoglobin b),
133–34; genetic counseling,
34, 120–21, 131; and health
care: —access to, 136–41, 146,
150, 152–56, 164; —costs of,
136–38, 146, 152–56; incidence, 133; infections, 117, 122,
124, 134–41, 150, 159, 233–
34; inheritance, 3, 17, 33, 117,
133, 224; issues of AfricanAmerican identity, 6, 75–77,
114, 116–17, 121, 125, 130, 132,
164–65, 169 (see also thalassemia); legislation, 75–77, 113,
128; and malaria, 117; as molecular disease, 122–33; mortality, 4, 117, 124, 151; nature
of malady as ‘‘blood disease’’
(hemoglobinopathy), 122–32;
obscurity, 122–233; pain and
crisis, 117, 121, 128–29, 132–
34, 138–41, 145, 150–51, 158,
164; patient experiences and
symptoms, 4–5, 12, 116, 119–
21, 122, 124, 133–34, 138–41,
145, 146–47, 149, 154–57, 164;
and pneumonia, 122; prevalence, 116; prevention, 134,
162; and racial politics/socioeconomic issues, 34, 75–77,
79, 117, 119, 121, 125, 128,
130–31, 138–41, 148, 153–56,
159, 164–65; and reductionism, 123–30; specialists, 116,
118–21, 122, 124, 130–31, 136–
37, 140–41, 147–53, 156–57;
symbolic significance, 1, 6,
10, 75–76, 117, 121, 125, 128,
132, 134, 138–41; treatment
options, 5, 32, 118–20, 124–32,
134–35, 136–59, 161, 164–65,
213, 215, 219, 225, 230, 234;
—antibiotics, 124, 134, 136–38,
141, 146, 215; —5-azacytidine,
142–44, 146; —bone marrow
transplantation (BMT), 5, 12,
32, 119–20, 135, 141, 147–58,
159, 161, 164–65, 219, 225;
—comprehensive care, 118,
130, 137, 149; —de-sickling
agents, 124–25, 128–29, 131–
32, 140, 213; —gene therapy,
95, 119–21, 141, 143, 158, 169;
—hydroxyurea, 141–47, 156,
158, 230; —narcotic painkillers, 132, 139–41; —risks and
side effects, 119, 120, 125–32,
135, 137, 139, 142–44, 146–57,
164–65; urea, 119, 125–32, 213,
234
Sickle Cell Disease Association,
158
Siegler, Mark, 29, 45
specialists and specialty groups,
4; adolescent medicine, 87,
204; cardiologists, 172; and
cystic fibrosis, 12, 70, 72, 77,
80, 84–85, 90–91, 94, 100–102,
105, 108, 110–11, 118, 120–21,
123, 139, 147; family medicine,
72; ‘‘gene doctors,’’ 95–103,
121, 125, 143, 157; geneticists,
8, 17, 20, 29, 61, 111, 163; hematologists, 4, 116, 122–23, 130,
135, 149–53, 157–58; molecular
biology, 122–25, 127; neurologists, 4, 41; oncologists, 4,
158; pediatrician/pediatrics,
68, 84, 87; pulmonologists, 4,
66, 97; and sickle cell disease,
116, 118–21, 122, 124, 130–31,
136–37, 140–41, 147–53, 156–
57; surgeons, 4, 85, 88–91, 111,
155; and Tay-Sachs disease,
Index [247]
specialists and specialty groups
(continued)
21–22, 24, 26, 30–31; transplant medicine, 85–89, 95, 104,
147–57
Spray, Thomas, 89
Stolberg, Sheryl Gay, 104, 109
Switzerland, 62
Targeted Genetics Corporation,
108
Tay, Warren, 21
Tay-Sachs disease (TSD), 1, 3–7,
9–10, 12–60, 63–65, 67, 68,
75, 80, 111, 116, 118, 120, 141,
161–62, 164–67, 169–70, 173,
224, 230, 234; and abortion,
18; avoidance of TSD birth,
16, 36, 41; carriers, 26–27,
35, 37–50; causes and mechanisms, 3, 24–27, 33, 51, 57,
224, 230; diagnostic advances,
16, 21–26, 33; —detection,
26, 38; —genetic testing, 16,
29; —Hex-a deficiency, 24–
27; —identification of enzyme
deficiency, 24; gene and gene
frequency, 24, 27; incidence,
16, 27; inheritance, 3, 27, 33,
224; issues of identity: —and
Franco-Americans and French
Canadians, 19, 41, 169; —and
Jewish identity, 4, 6–7, 15–16,
23, 27, 34–35, 75, 114, 169;
—and Louisiana Cajuns, 19,
41, 169; —and Pennsylvania
Dutch, 19; nature of malady:
—as ‘‘brain disorder,’’ 22,
[248] Index
26; —as ‘‘Jewish amaurotic
idiocy,’’ 7, 15, 21–22; —as lipid
storage disorder, 16, 22–23,
25–26; —as lysosomal storage disorder, 16, 22, 51, 231;
parents’ experiences, 4, 14–15,
24, 34–36, 41, 43, 188; patient
experiences and symptoms, 4,
14–15, 16, 18, 21–24, 26–28,
34–36, 41, 111, 118; population
studies, 23, 169; prevention,
12, 16–28, 26–41, 55, 118, 161–
62 (see also Dor Yeshorim); and
rabbis, 17–20, 34, 39, 41–50,
51, 55, 189, 194; reproductive
counseling, 16; and researchers,
21–22, 24, 26, 30–31; risk(s)
for, 16–17, 39–40, 44; screening, 16, 28, 30, 41–50, 189;
symbolic significance, 1, 6, 10,
15, 75–76; treatment options,
16, 22, 26–32, 40, 95
Tendler, Rabbi Moshe, 49
Tennessee, 43
thalassemia, 5, 79, 117, 143, 194,
234; in Italy and Greece, 117
Thomas, E. Donnall, 136, 152,
164–65
transplantation, 5, 32, 59, 67,
80, 85–91, 93, 95, 97, 103, 111,
119–20, 135, 141, 147–58, 161,
164–65, 225, 229. See also cystic
fibrosis, treatment options—
lung/heart-lung transplantation; sickle cell disease, treatment options—bone marrow
transplantation
tuberculosis, 25, 81
Turkey, 62
Tuskegee syphilis study, 116, 121
Twilight of the Golds, 13
University of Chicago, 154–55
University of Pennsylvania, 101,
103–4, 105–8, 208–9
U.S. Congress, 5–6, 76, 101, 130.
See also legislation
U.S. Senate Committee on Small
Business, 101
X-linked inheritance, 234–35
Watson, James, 123
Weber, Max, 163
white, European, Euro-, and
Anglo-Americans, 1, 3, 4, 5,
8–10, 34, 67, 79, 92, 96, 111–
12, 114, 120, 148, 162–63, 169,
170, 180; American Jews as
‘‘white,’’ 9, 17, 36; Anglo-Saxon
Protestant Americans, 34, 113;
and ethnicity, 7, 17, 113–14;
and heart disease, 171; history
and identity, 7, 8–10, 61–63,
67, 112–14, 121, 159, 164, 170;
as ideological category, 8–9,
62, 114; as majority group, 67,
112–13, 121, 162, 163, 165; and
‘‘white’’ disease(s), 7, 60, 61,
67, 76, 78–79, 91, 92, 95, 96,
111–13, 158–59, 169–70; and
‘‘white’’ genes, 62
Wilson, James, 101, 103, 105,
107–8, 209
Index [249]